The Red Wolf And The Sorcerer's Stone
by Leopardfang of Moonclan
Summary: FemHarry! Post Wolfs Rain! Heather Potter is abandoned and raised by the pack. Then Hagrid comes and tells her she's a witch. Time to show these witches and wizards that a wand won't always save you. Heather has strong jaws and legs to back her up. Draco is not going to have the easiest year. WARNING, badass Heather Potter a head. Please Review! No Flames!
1. Prologue

**I do not own Harry Potter or Wolf's Rain. I will not be writing the accents because they are hard to write and very annoying.**

A tiny baby girl was left on the Dursley's front door. Her name was Heather Potter. Her parents had been killed by Voldemort, but she had defeated him because of her mother's loving sacrifice. Heather was marked from the experience; she had a lightning bolt scar on her forehead. Heather had large, strikingly green almond shaped eyes, dark red hair and pale skin. The little girl looked at her surroundings. What was going to happen now? Who would raise The Girl Who Lived?

"All these houses are the same! It's starting to creep me out." A boy whined. He had brown hair, brown eyes and was a little chubby. He was wearing a collar, yellow hoodie, jeans and sneakers.

"Stop whining Hige! We'll be out of here soon enough." Another voice said. He was tan, had silver hair, gold eyes and was clad in leather.

"Hey look at that!" A younger voice said.

The youngest voice jogged up to the door step of the Dursley's. He looked down at the little girl. She stared back at him with wide curious eyes. The boy had darker brown hair and had three silver bracelets on his wrist. The others walked over, six in total and looked down at the little girl. One of the females in the group, the one with blue eyes, picked up the note that was delivered with Heather.

"It says her name is Heather Lillian Potter and that her parents are dead. These must be her other blood family. She's obviously to be entrusted into their care." She said, putting the note back.

"They've already been out here. I can smell them on her. The female wears way to much perfume." Hige said, covering his sensitive nose.

"They abandoned her." The leader said. He had tan skin, sea green eyes and dark brown hair.

"What should we do Kiba?" The youngest member asked.

"Nothing Toboe. This is a human's problem." Kiba said, getting back to his feet.

"But she's only a baby." Toboe protested.

"She's a human." The silver haired one growled.

"But Tsume!" Toboe protested again.

The other female, the one with red eyes, knelt down and picked up the baby girl. The little girl made a giggling sound.

"This one will care for her." She said.

"Are you sure Cheza?" Kiba asked. Cheza nodded. Kiba sighed. "All right then." The group then walked off, bringing the girl with them, never looking back.


	2. The Letter

**I do not own Harry Potter or Wolf's Rain. I will not be writing the accents because they are hard to write and very annoying.**

Heather was ten now, almost eleven, in fact tonight was her birthday. She was now in her wolf form. She had ginger fur, white chest, belly, paws, cheeks and jaws. The rims of her ears were black, as was the tip of her tail. After the whole Darcia craziness, the pack had been searching for a good place to settle down and establish a territory. Heather had fought Darcia and ended up with scars all over her body, but she wore them with pride. Her face remained unmarked except for her lightning bolt scar on her forehead. Her green eyes burned with a fierce determination to keep up with her pack.

Heather knew about how they found her and that she was really a human but she couldn't care less. The human species had rejected her and the wolf species saved her and she was eternally grateful. She could never repay them but she would serve her pack until the end of her days. She wasn't quite as big as Toboe but she was still a strong wolf.

"Let's rest for a little bit." Kiba said.

Heather pulled down to a stop and sat down, panting a little. She wasn't as strong as the others but she did have a decent amount of agility. Heather shifted into her human form. She long blood red curly hair that was actually red, the color of blood from a deep wound that stood out against her pale skin, her bright emerald eyes glowed in the shadows. Heather wore a camo jacket with a furry hood, jeans, black sneakers and a black tank top. Heather's super sharp hearing skills picked up something in the distance. It sounded like a motor.

"Do you hear that?" Heather asked.

Everyone nodded and they all immediately got into attack stances. Heather felt her teeth sharpen, a deep growl rumbled in her throat. Whoever was coming their way, was about to be torn to pieces.

"HEATHER POTTER!" A booming voice called. The wolf's green eyes widened. Her pack mates turned towards her in surprise. Heather shrugged her shoulders.

"MS. POTTER! I BEEN LOOK'IN FOR YOU FOR QUITE A WHILE NOW!" The voice yelled again.

A bright head light blinded the wolves as it came towards them. It was followed with the sound of a motor engine, a loud one at that. Once the light dimmed Heather got a good look at who was driving the motorcycle. He was at least 11 feet tall; he had a big bushy black beard and beady black eyes. He seemed to be wearing clothing made out of various animal pelts. He looked at Heather and smiled.

"Well, you look very well lass! You've grown so much since I last saw you! But then again, you were just a baby when I left you in the custody of the Dursley's." The man said in a happy voice.

Sensing that this man didn't pose a threat, the wolves relaxed, but still eyed him cautiously. Heather took a step forward. "Um…who are you?"

"Oh, name's Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds of Hogwarts. But everybody calls me Hagrid. Now, I just remembered, I have something for you. Might have sat on it on the way here, but I imagine it'll be just as good." Hagrid said, he turned around and picked something up from his motorcycle. He gave it to Heather. The red haired girl opened it and saw a slightly deformed cake inside with the words '_Happy Birthday Heather' _written inside. Heather smiled politely.

"Thank you, not to seem rude or anything but-"

"Why are you here?" Tsume growled. Heather glared at him and let out a growl of her own.

"Oh, I'm here to help Heather collect her supplies for Hogwarts." Hagrid said.

"Hogwhat?" Heather asked with a raised eyebrow.

"You don't know about Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry? Well where did you suspect your parents learned it all?" Hagrid asked. Heather cocked her head to the side and continued to stare at him in confusion.

"Learned what?" Toboe asked.

"Magic of course! You're a witch Heather." Hagrid said.

"Hey!" Heather said indignantly.

"Not that kind of witch!" Hagrid reassured her, noticing the others tense up and appear ready to pounce. "A witch with powers, magic powers, didn't you know that?" Hagrid asked. Heather shook her head and then Hagrid seemed to get angry. "Those damned Dursley's! Not telling Heather Potter about her powers while she's been living with them for eleven years!"

"She doesn't live with the humans." Kiba said, earning Hagrid's attention.

"They abandoned her!" Toboe said, stepping closer towards Heather.

"We took her in and she's been with us ever since." Hige said. By now, all of the pack was standing protectively beside Heather, making the girl smile. The amount of protectiveness her pack felt for her made her feel like she truly belonged.

"Well, I guess it's better to be raised by these wolves, the Dursley's were really our last resort after your parents died Heather." Hagrid said sadly at the mention of Heather's parents. Heather shrugged, on her journey, her heart had hardened, her parents had died but she wasn't a crybaby about it. She had never met them so she wasn't to sad whenever her parents came up into discussion.

"Well, tomorrow I'll be taking you down to Diagon Alley to get your school supplies." Hagrid said. Oh in fact," Hagrid said getting something from his coat, "here is your acceptance letter."

He gave it to Heather. The girl shrugged and opened it. Her pack mates looked over her shoulders to see the leter for themselves.

**HOGWARTS SCHOOL _of_ WITCHCRAFT _and_ WIZARDRY**

**Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore**

**_(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)_**

**Dear Miss. Potter,**

**We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.**

**Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July.**

**Yours sincerely,**

**Minerva McGonagall**

**Deputy Headmistress**

**Second page**

**HOGWARTS SCHOOL _of _WITCHCRAFT _and_ WIZARDRY**

**UNIFORM**

**First-year students will require:**

**1. Three sets of plain work robes (black)2. One plain pointed hat (black) for day wear3. One pair of protective gloves (dragon hide or similar)4. One winter cloak (black, with silver fastenings)**

**Please note that all pupil's clothes should carry name tags.**

**COURSE BOOKS**

**All students should have a copy of each of the following:**

**_The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1)_**

**by Miranda Goshawk**

**_A History of Magic_**

**_by Bathilda Bagshot_**

**_Magical Theory _**

**_by Adalbert Waffling_**

**_A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration_**

**_by Emeric Switch_**

**_One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi_**

**_by Phyllida Spore_**

**_Magical Drafts and Potions_**

**_by Arsenius Jigger_**

**_Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_**

**_by Newt Scamander_**

**_The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection_**

**_by Quentin Trimble_**

**OTHER EQUIPMENT**

**1 wand1 cauldron (pewter, standard size 2)1 set glass or crystal phials1 telescope1 set brass scales**

**Students may also bring, if they desire, an owl OR a cat OR a toad.**

**PARENTS ARE REMINDED THAT FIRST YEARS**

**ARE NOT ALLOWED THEIR OWN BROOMSTICK**

**Yours sincerely,**

**Lucinda Thomsonicle-Pocus**

"She never said she wanted to go." Tsume said once he finished the letter, his teeth beginning to sharpen.

"Do you want to go to this school Heather?" Blue asked.

Heather thought for a moment, she remembered all the weird things that had happened. Whenever she threw tantrums stuff would move and fly across the room, one time she turned Kiba's fur pink(no one could take him seriously while he looked like that) and one time she had a conversation with a snake. Heather then thought of what she could possibly learn. Who knows what she could do with the proper training? For all she knew she could probably trick prey into wanting to be eaten.

"Yes, I want to learn what I can really do. But I want them to come with me to get my supplies." Heather said, her tone strongly giving Hagrid a signal not to argue.

"But first," Heather added. "We need to establish a territory. A place to call home. We've been meaning to settle down." Heather said. Hagrid appeared to think hard for a few minutes before he remembered something.

"I know an abandoned mansion not far from here. It's in the forest, plenty of prey running around."

"Sounds perfect, don't you think Kiba?" Hige asked.

"Yes...show us this place, and we will travel with you tomorrow." Kiba said.

Hagrid nodded and got black into his motorcycle. He put his helmet back on and started it up. When he looked back up, the group had transformed into wolves. Hagrid's eyes widened. The wolves stared back at him, waiting for him to show them their possible new home. Hagrid revved up the engine and took off. The pack followed him in hot pursuit. Heather watched the trees speed by. The red she-wolf ran in the center of the pack, her eyes peeled to see if she could see her possible new home. Finally the trees began to part and Heather could see a clearing.

The mansion was very large but it was starting to fall apart. There were stone bricks missing, the iron gate was open and creeking back and forth in the wind. It was looking very overgrown. It was perfect. Hagrid parked the motorcycle and walked onto the mansion grounds, the wolves following him while looking around. They walked in the big doors and began to explore. Blue and Tsume stayed with Hagrid, to make sure he didn't do anything while the others explored the mansion. It was very dusty and there were cobwebs everywhere. There was some old furniture around the house, like the family just up and left.

Heather sniffed around, sneezing occasionally because of dust inhalation. Heather followed her nose towards a section of the wall that had crumbled away. The red she-wolf noticed that there were stairs hidden in there. She leapt over the rubble and began to follow the stairs up and up and up. Soon Heather got tired of walking and ran up the stairs. When she finally got to the end she was in a very large room. It must have been the owner's room and the owner must have been a female. There was a large four-poster bed that had no sheets, a couch that had some holes in it and a vanity with so much dust on the mirror you couldn't see through it. There was also a large crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling that may or may not still work. There was a balcony with large glass doors.

Heather shifted into her human form and pushed the tattered curtains aside. She then opened the doors and a large wind hit her in the face, blowing her scarlet locks out of her face. Dust blew around from the room, probably the first gust of wind the room had seen in decades. Heather stepped out and looked over the forest. She could see the full moon high in the back night sky. The stars shinned like a billion diamonds in the sky. Heather heard paw-steps coming her way. With a singal sniff of the air Heather recognized th visitor as Blue. The fellow she-wolf came up the last few stairs in her human form.

"We've all picked out rooms. Feel like you want this one?" Blue asked, looking around, that soft smile on her face.

Heather nodded. "It feels good to finally have a place to stay. We've been traveling a long time and I've been traveling all my life. With a little work, this old mansion and forest will be our Paradise." The girl looked up at the moon. It's reflection shone in her green eyes.

"Let's head back and join everyone. Hagrid sent a message to he Headmaster that he found you and that you'll be attending the school." Blue said. Heather nodded and followed Blue down stairs.

Once everyone was downstairs they all settled down. Hagrid was laying down on a busted up old couch, saying that they would go get supplies tomorrow. He wrote down a letter and gave it to an owl he pulled out from his coat, it then flew out through a gap in the walls. All the wolves huddled up together. Heather snuggled up, enjoying the warmth that radiated off her pack mates' fur. Tomorrow was another day, and another adventure. The wolf closed her green eyes and sighed contently. She eventually fell asleep to her fellow wolves' even breaths, steady heart beats and Hagrid's snoring.


	3. Diagon Alley

**I do not own Harry Potter or Wolf's Rain. Now that I have my book with me I will write accents. Not everything will be the same between Heather and Draco. Remember, Heather is a female wolf/human and future veela mate of Draco, so no comments on "That wasn't how he acted towards harry". **

Heather felt the glare of the sun right over her closed eyes. She opened her eyes just enough to become aware of her surroundings. The wolf's eyes adjusted to the light and she carefully stood up, trying not to wake Hige, the only one who was still asleep. Heather stretched and let out a long yawn, revealing her razor sharp teeth. She looked over and saw Hagrid still asleep on the couch. It wasn't a dream, it really happened. Heather was actually pretty excited; she would be able to learn what her parents had learned.

Heather walked over to where Hagrid was snoozing. She was about to prod him awake when she heard tapping on the glass. Blue, who was already up, walked over and opened the glass door, which was closed by a hook, with her nose. The owl swooped in and dropped a newspaper on top of Hagrid, who didn't wake up. The owl then fluttered to the floor and began to attack Hagrid's coat. Toboe growled and got into an attack crouch, ready to catch his breakfast.

"Don't do that."

"Hagrid!" Heather said loudly. "There's an owl-"

"Pay him," Hagrid grunted into the sofa.

"What?" Tsume scoffed in disbelief.

"He wants payin' fer deleverin' the paper. Look in the pockets."

Heather shifted to her human form. Hagrid's coat seemed to be made of nothing but pockets- bunches of keys, slug pellets, balls of string, peppermint humbugs, teabags…finally, Heather pulled out a handful of strange looking coins.

"Give him five Knuts," said Hagrid sleepily.

"Knuts?"

"The little bronze ones."

Heather did as she was told and the owl held out his leg so that Heather could put the money into the small leather pouch that was tied to it. Then he flew off through the open window. Toboe seemed to be disappointed.

"I wanted to eat it." He wined.

"Don't worry," Hige's sleepy voice said, he was just waking up "Tsume and Kiba went out to see what was around."

"And there is plenty."

Tsume and Kiba walked in not carrying deer or elk, but several smaller kills, rabbits, beavers, foxes, squirrels and various birds. "We didn't want to stray too far since we should be leaving soon," Kiba said.

"We smelled a lot of big game. This place is loaded!" Tsume said as Heather took a goose and squirrel for herself. She settled down and sank her fangs into the delicious meat. It felt so good to have something in her stomach.

"Mmm…this is the most food we've had in…forever!" Hige said, taking a lot of prey.

"It's hard fer yeh to hunt?" Hagrid asked, taking a bit of sausage.

"No," Kiba explained "we just aren't in areas with a lot of prey available. Often we've been lucky enough to find human food to eat, never mind live prey." Kiba then took a big bite of a beaver.

Once every one had eaten their fill Hagrid yawned loudly, stretched and stood up. "Best be off, Heather, lot's ter do today, gotta get up ter London an' buy all yer stuff fer school."

Heather stood up and shook her pelt when she remembered something. "Uh Hagrid, wolves don't exactly carry money."

"Don't worry about that," Hagrid said, standing up and scratching his head. "D'yeh think yer parents didn't leave yeh anything?"

"Well, guess I never thought about it," Heather said.

"First stop fer us Gringotts. Wizard's bank," Hagrid said.

"Wizards have banks?" Blue asked curiously.

"Just the one. Gringotts. Run by Goblins."

Hige's jaw dropped, which Heather found funny. "Goblins?"

"Yeah-so yeh'd be mad ter try an' rob it, I'll tell yeh that. Never mess with Goblins Heather. Gringotts is the safest place in the world fer anything yeh want ter keep safe- 'cept maybe Hogwarts. As a matter o' fact, I gotta visit Gringotts anyway. Fer Dumbledore. Hogwarts business." Hagrid drew himself up proudly. "He usually gets me ter do important stuff fer him. Fetchin' you- getting' things from Gringotts- knows he can trust me, see? Got everythin'? Come on, then."

On the run to London, Kiba asked Hagrid loudly over the roar of his motorcycle engine. "Why would you be mad to try and rob Gringotts?"

"Spells, enchantments. They say there's dragons' guardin' the high security vaults. And then yeh gotta find yer way-Gringotts is hundreds of miles under London, see? Deep under the Underground. Yeh'd die of hunger tryin' ter get out, even if yeh did manage ter get yer hands on summat."

There were a few more questions throughout the journey; apparently there was a Ministry of Magic. Not that it would matter much to wolves. Heather couldn't help but wonder why humans couldn't just be self-supportive, get all you need by yourself. Maybe with a pack but still, it seemed if one human in high power screwed up everybody fell. Before they got into the city, the wolves shifted into their human forms.

This city was much cleaner than some of the other cities that Heather had seen. It was great to walk on clean streets; although the smells were a little hard on her nose it was still much more bearable. There were so many more pros of this city compared to others. After some more walking, Heather looked at the supply list again.

"Can we seriously buy all this in London?" Heather asked, raising a bemused eyebrow at Hagrid.

"I don't exactly see a place that says "Wands! Fifty percent off!" Hige said dramatically, not caring that he was drawing attention from passing strangers.

"Yeh can find it if yeh know where to go," said Hagrid.

Neither Heather nor the pack had been to London before. Although Hagrid seemed to know where he was going, he was obviously not used to getting there the normal way. He got stuck in the ticket barrier on the Underground, and complained loudly that the seats were too small and the train ride that Hagrid had to kind of coax the wolves to take, was to slow.

"I don't know how the Muggles manage without manage without magic," he said as they climbed a broken down escalator that lead to a bustling road lined with shops.

"Live like one for a year or two." Toboe said. "Then you'll know."

"No, the wizardin' world is enough fer me." Hagrid said with a kind smile, ruffling Toboe's hair.

Hagrid was so huge he parted the crowd easily; all the wolves had to do was keep close behind him. They passed book shops and music stores, hamburger restaurants and cinemas, but nowhere that looked as if it could sell you a magic wand. Then again Heather didn't know what to expect, maybe a big sign that said "Wands R Us". But this was just a street filled with ordinary people.

"This is it," said Hagrid, coming to a halt, "the Leaky Cauldron. It's a famous place."

It was a tiny, grubby looking pub. If Hagrid hadn't pointed it out, Heather and the pack wouldn't have noticed it was there. Kiba and Tsume wrinkled their noses in disgust. They hated human places the most compared to the rest of the pack. The people hurrying by didn't glance at it. Their eyes slipped from the big book shop on one side to the record shop on the other as if they couldn't see the Leaky Cauldron at all. In fact, Heather had a feeling it was only she, Hagrid and the pack that could see the Leaky Cauldron.

For a famous place, it was very dark and shabby. A few old women were sitting in a corner, drinking tiny glasses of sherry. One of them was smoking a long pipe. A little man in a top hat was talking to the old bartender, who was quite bald and looked like a toothless walnut. The low buzz of chatter dropped when they walked in. This made the pack tense. Under cold glares, especially Tsume's golden one, they seemed to shrink back. But everyone seemed to know Hagrid; they waved and smiled at him, and the bartender reached for a glass, saying, "The usual Hagrid?"

"Can't, Tom, I'm on Hogwarts business," said Hagrid, clapping his great hand on Heather's shoulder. Now a normal person's knees would have buckled but Heather didn't so much as blink.

"Good Lord," said the bartender, peering at Heather, "is this- can't this be-?"

The Leaky Cauldron had suddenly gone completely still and silent.

"Bless my soul," whispered the old bartender, "Heather Potter… what an honor."

He hurried out from behind the bar, rushed towards Heather and seized her hand, tears in his eyes. Heather's eyes were wide with shock, as were the packs.

"Welcome back, Ms. Potter, welcome back."

Heather didn't know what to say. Everyone was looking at her. The old woman with the pipe was puffing on it without realizing it had gone out. Hagrid was beaming.

Then there was a great scraping of chairs and the next moment, Heather found herself shaking hands, or having her hand get kissed, with/by everyone in the Leaky Cauldron. Realizing the pack was her family, they all greeted them to.

"Doris Crockford, Ms. Potter, can't believe I'm meeting you at last."

"So proud, Ms. Potter, I'm just so proud."

"Always wanted to shake your hand- I'm all of a flutter."

"Delighted, Ms. Potter just can't tell you, Diggle's the name, Dedalus Diggle."

"I've seen you before!" said Heather, as Dedalus Diggle's top hat fell off in his excitement.

"Yeah I remember him to!" Hige said, "You bowed to her once in a shop."

"She remembers!" cried Dedalus Diggle, looking at everyone. "Did you hear that? She remembers me!"

Heather shook hands again and again- Doris Crockford kept coming back for more.

A pale young man made his way forward, very nervously. One of his eyes was twitching.

"Professor Quirell!" said Hagrid. "Heather, Professor Quirell will be one of your teachers at Hogwarts."

"P-P-Potter." Stammered Quirell, grasping Heather's hand, "c-can't t-tell you how p-pleased I am to meet you."

"What subject do you teach?" Heather asked curiously.

"D-Defense Against the D-D-Dark Arts," muttered Professor Quirell, as though he'd rather not think about it. "N-not that you n-need it, eh, P-P-Potter?" He laughed nervously. "You'll be g-getting all you equipment, I suppose? I've g-got to p-pick up a new b-book on vampires, m-myself." He looked terrified at the very thought.

But the others wouldn't let Professor Quirell keep Heather to himself. It took almost ten minutes to get away from them all. At last, Hagrid managed to make himself heard over the babble.

"Must get on-lots ter buy. Come on, Heather."

Doris Crockford shook Heather's hand one last time, and Hagrid led them through the bar and out into a small, walled courtyard, where there was nothing but a trashcan and a few weeds. Tsume grinned at Heather.

"Looks like your popular." He teased.

"Yeah Heather, that one guy was shaking like he was the lowliest Omega and you were the top Alpha." Hige chuckled. Heather elbowed him in the ribs, making Hige yelp sharply.

Hagrid grinned sheepishly. "Guess I shoulda' warned yeh. You're famous here Heather. There isn't a witch or wizard that doesn't know yer name. Even Professor Quirell was tremblin'- mind you he's usually tremblin'."

"Is he always that nervous?" Blue asked.

"Oh, yeah. Poor bloke. Brilliant mind. He was fine while he was studyin' outta books but then he took off ter get some first-hand experience…They say he met some vampires in the Black Forest, and there was a nasty bit o' trouble with a hag- never been the same since. Scared of students, scared of his own subject- now, where's me umbrella?"

Vampires? Hags? Oh this was going to be interesting. New enemies to fight. Hagrid, meanwhile, was counting bricks in the wall above the trash can.

"Three up... two across..." he muttered." Right, stand back, you lot."

He tapped the wall three times with the point of his umbrella.

The brick he had touched quivered-it wriggled-in the middle, a small hole appeared-it grew wider and wider- a second later they were facing a large archway large enough for even Hagrid, an archway onto a cobbled street that twisted and turned out of sight.

"Welcome," said Hagrid, "to Diagon Alley."

He grinned at the Pack's amazement. They stepped through the archway. Heather looked over her shoulder quickly and saw the archway shrink instantly back into solid wall.

The sun shone brightly on a stack of cauldrons outside the nearest shop. Cauldrons-All Sizes-Copper, Brass, Pewter, Silver-Self Stirring- Collapsible, said a sign hanging over them. Heather and the pack sniffed the, so many humans and so many new scents; both Heather's nose and brain were going into overdrive to memorize them all.

"Yeah, you'll be needin' a cauldron," said Hagrid, "but we gotta get yer money first."

"Oh I just remembered," Heather said, "I never really introduced the rest of my pack." Heather giggled sheepishly.

"Yeah," Hige chuckled, "it was pretty much just 'Heather you're a witch and you're going to magic school." Hige said dramatically.

There were a few chuckles that came from the group. Hagrid was smiling.

"This is Kiba; he's the Alpha of our pack, meaning he's the leader." Heather said, gesturing towards the boy with shaggy brown hair, blue-green eyes and a scarred face.

"This is Tsume, he's Beta, which is basically a bodyguard for the Alpha." Heather then quickly wrapped up her introductions.

"Well it's nice to finally know yer names. It would be a little bit awkward if I jus' started talkin' to yeh but didn' know yer name." Hagrid said. They then continued Diagon Alley.

"Gringotts," said Hagrid.

They had reached a snowy white building that towered over the other little shops. Standing beside its burnished bronze doors, wearing uniform of scarlet and gold, was-

"Yeah, that's a goblin," said Hagrid quietly, as they walked up the white stone steps towards him. The goblin was about a head shorter than Heather. He had a swarthy, clever face, a pointed beard and, Heather noticed, very long fingers and feet. He bowed as they walked inside, which made a smirk grow on Tsume's face. Now they were facing a second pair of doors, silver this time, with words engraved upon them.

_Enter, stranger, but take heed_

_Of what awaits the sin of greed,_

_For those who take, but do not earn,_

_Must pay most dearly in their turn._

_So if you seek beneath our floors_

_A treasure that was never yours,_

_Thief, you have been warned, beware_

_Of finding more than treasure there._

"Like I said, yeh'd be mad ter try an' rob it," said Hagrid.

A pair of goblins bowed them through the silver doors and they were in a vast marble hall. About a hundred other goblins were sitting on high stools behind a long counter, scribbling in large ledgers, weighing coins in brass scales, examining precious stones through eyeglasses. There were too many doors to count leading off the hall, and yet the goblins were showing more people in and out of these. Hagrid, Heather and the Pack made way for the counter. Tsume was looking at the goblins with a dangerous glint in his eyes.

"You can't eat the goblins Tsume," Blue said, sending him a hard look from the corner of her eye.

"Can't I just pick off one of the little sick ones?" Tsume said, looking hungrily at a particular small one.

"No!" Kiba said forcefully. Tsume sighed agitatedly but listened to the leader of the pack.

"Morning," said Hagrid to a free goblin. "We've come ter take some money outta Ms. Heather Potter's safe."

"You have her key, sir?"

"Got it here somewhere," said Hagrid, and he started emptying his pockets onto the counter, scattering a handful of moldy dog biscuits all over the goblin's book of numbers. The goblin wrinkled his nose. Heather's nose wrinkled to, they smelled disgusting. Nothing smelled worst to a wolf then expired dog treats.

"Got it," said Hagrid at last, holding a tiny key.

The goblin looked at it closely. "That seems to be in order."

"An' I've also got a letter here from Professor Dumbledore," said Hagrid importantly, throwing out his chest, making some of the pack members snicker. "It's about You-Know-What in vault seven hundred and thirteen."

The goblin read the letter carefully.

"Very well," he said, handing it back to Hagrid, "I will have someone take all of you down to your vaults. Griphook!"

Griphook was yet another goblin. Once Hagrid had crammed all the dog biscuits back in his pockets, he and the pack followed Griphook towards one of the doors leading off the hall.

"What's the You-Know-What in vault seven hundred and thirteen?" Heather asked.

"Can't tell yeh that," said Hagrid mysteriously, only making Heather more curious. "Very secret. Hogwarts business. More'n my job's worth ter tell yeh that."

That didn't help ease Heather's curiosity, or the pack's, but at least they had a hint. It was really valuable, but there were still many possibilities, not to mentions all the wizard-y ones that the pack knew nothing about. Griphook held the door open for them. Heather, who expected more marble, was surprised. There was a narrow stone passageway lit with flaming torches. Heather sniffed the air; this tunnel was very large and went deep underground. It sloped steeply downward and there were little railroad tracks on the floor. Griphook whistled and a small cart came hurtling up the tracks towards them. They climbed in-Hagrid with some difficulty-and they were off.

Heather was sitting on Kiba's lap, which made her blush just the tiniest bit. Heather had a tiny crush on Kiba, but not a serious crush; it was more like he's the cute leader. She wasn't serious enough to chase after him though. At first they just hurtled through a maze of twisting passages. The rattling cart seemed to know its own way because Griphook wasn't steering.

Hige had his hands up in the air like it was a rollercoaster and was cheering. Blue was clinging to him and she was fighting to keep her face straight. Heather's eyes stung as the cold air rushed past them, but she kept them wide open. Once, she thought she saw a burst of fire at the end of a passage and twisted around to see if it was a dragon, taking a big whiff as well, but she didn't see it. She smelled it though; it smelled a lot like the reptiles she would occasionally catch. She could only assume it was a dragon. Then they plunged even deeper, passing an underground lake where huge stalactites and stalagmites grew from the ceiling and the floor.

"I never know," Heather called to Hagrid over the noise of the cart, "what's the difference between a stalactite and a stalagmite?"

"Stalagmite's got an 'm' in it," said Hagrid. "An' don' ask me questions just now, I think I'm gonna be sick."

He did look very green, and when the cart stopped at last beside a small door in the passage wall, Hagrid got out and had to lean against the wall to stop his knees from trembling.

Griphook unlocked the door. A lot of green smoke came billowing out, and as it cleared, Heather's eyes widened. Inside were mounds of gold coins. Columns of silver. Heaps of little bronze Knuts.

"All yours," smiled Hagrid.

"Sweet." The pack helped Heather pile some coins into a small drawstring bag. It opened way wider than it should have. Hagrid said it was enchanted; it could stretch as wide as you want and you could fit anything in it. To get something specific back out all you had to do was think about it, reach in and pull out the desired object.

"The gold ones are galleons," Hagrid explained. "Seventeen silver Sickles to a Galleon and twenty nine Knuts to a Sickle, it's easy enough. Right, that should be enough fer a couple o' terms; we'll keep the rest safe for yeh." He turned to Griphook. "Vault seven hundred and thirteen now, please, and can we go more slowly?"

"One speed only," said Griphook.

They were going even deeper now and gathering speed, which made Hige cheer louder and made Blue grip him tighter. The air became colder and colder as they hurdled round tight corners. They went hurtling over an underground ravine, and Heather leaned over the side to try and see what was down at the dark bottom, but Hagrid groaned and pulled her back by the scruff of her neck, which made her yelp indignantly.

"I'm not a pup!" This made Tsume and Hige snigger. This caused Heather to smack both of them over the back of the head.

Vault seven hundred and thirteen had no key hole.

"Stand back," said Griphook importantly. He stroked the door gently with one of his large fingers and it simply melted away.

"If anyone but a Gringotts goblin tried that, they'd be sucked through the door and trapped in there," said Griphook.

"How often do you check to see if anyone's inside?" asked Kiba.

"About once every ten years," said Griphook with a rather nasty smile.

Something extraordinary had to be inside this top security vault, Heather was sure, and she leaned forward eagerly, expecting to see fabulous jewels at least-but at first she thought it was empty. Then she noticed a grubby little package wrapped up in brown paper on the floor. Heather took it a good whiff. She could tell it was stone but it didn't smell like any ordinary stone. It smelled like leaves, water, fire, a spring breeze, basically it smelled like,

Life.

Hagrid picked it up and tucked it deep in his coat. Heather longed to know what it was, but knew better than to ask.

"Come on, back in this infernal cart, and don't talk to me on the way back, it's best to keep me mouth shut."

One wild cart ride later they stood blinking in the sunlight outside Gringotts. Heather didn't know where to run to first now that she had a bag full of money.

"Might as well get yer uniform," said Hagrid, nodding towards Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. "Listen, Heather, would yeh mind if I slipped off fer a pick-me-up in the Leaky Cauldron? I hate them Gringotts carts." He did still look a bit sick.

"Well, let's spilt up, we'll get more done faster." Blue said.

"I'll get her cauldron." Toboe said, Heather took out some Galleons and handed them to her pack mate who then ran off towards the store.

"Me and Tsume will get your books." Kiba said. Heather gave them some money.

"Wow, us going shopping for you," Tsume teased, "Kiba, are you sure she's not alpha?" He smirked.

Kiba glared at him but there was a tiny smile. "Quiet, let's go."

"Guess you're stuck with us to get your uniform." Hige said.

"Fin," Heather sighed, her eyes then lit up mischievously, "just don't conceive any pups in there." Both of them blushed furiously as the young she-wolf skipped away giggling into Madam Malkin's shop.

Madam Malkin was a squat, smiling witch dressed in all mauve.

"Hogwarts, dear?" she said, when Heather started to speak. "Got the lot here-a young man being fitted right now, in fact."

In the back of the shop a boy with a pale, pointed face was standing on a footstool while a second witch pinned up his long black robes. Madam Malkin stood Heather on the stool next to him, slipped a long black robe over her head, and began to pin it to the right length. Blue and Hige stood nearby and watched. Heather suddenly had an idea. She leaned down and whispered in Madam Malkin's ear. Her eyes widened.

"Well, I've never had a request like that before but I can certainly do that for you dear." She said.

"Thank you," Heather replied.

Blue and Hige looked at her curiously, but she just smirked. They rolled their eyes and smiled. Whatever Heather was doing, it would probably be to show off the fact that she was a wolf, and freak out the other students.

"Hello," said the boy, "Hogwarts, too?"

"Yes," said Heather.

"My father's next door buying my books and mother's up the street looking for wands," said the boy. He had a bored drawling voice. "Then I'm going to drag them off to go look at racing brooms. I don't see why firs years can't have their own. I think I'll bully my father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow." Heather's opinion of this guy was going down at a steady rate.

"Good luck with that. If there's one thing I know, is that not all adults are push overs." Heather thought of Kiba and Tsume. "But I will admit that some are." Heather gave a pointed look at Hige. He shrugged.

"You are very persuasive." He said.

"Well, yeah, but I know Blue can persuade you in other ways." Heather wiggled her eyebrows suggestively, making the two blush again. Heather cracked up. "I never get tired of that." Heather giggled.

"We do!" The pair said indignantly.

"Have you got your own broom?" the boy said, regaining Heather's attention.

"No," said Heather.

"Play Qudditch at all?"

"No," Heather said again, wondering what Quidditch was.

"I do-Father says it's a crime if I'm not picked to play for my house, and I must say, I agree. Know what house you'll be in yet?"

"No," said Heather, getting annoyed with this boy. Blue and Hige seemed to get annoyed to, as frowns appeared on their faces.

"Well no one really knows until they get there, do they, but I know I'll be in Slytherin, all our family have been-imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I'd leave, wouldn't you?"

Heather just stared ahead, mutely.

"I say, look at that man!" said the boy suddenly, nodding towards the front window. Hagrid was standing out there, grinning at Heather and pointing to a tray of cheeseburgers to show he couldn't come in.

"That's Hagrid," said Heather, pleased that she knew something that the boy didn't know. "He works at Hogwarts."

"Oh," said the boy, "I've heard of him. He's a sort servant, isn't he?"

"He's the gamekeeper," said Heather. She was liking this boy less and less.

"Yes exactly, I heard he's a sort of savage-lives in a hut on the school grounds and every now and then he gets drunk, tries to do magic, and ends up setting fire to his bed."

"I think he's brilliant," said Heather coldly.

"Do you?" said the boy, with a slight sneer. "Why is he with you? Where are your parents?"

"They're dead," Heather said shortly. There was nothing else to it.

"Oh, sorry," he actually sounded sorry, which made him gain a point. "But they were our kind, weren't they?"

What did it matter? Heather decided to clear things up. "Listen buddy," Heather began, making the boy's eyes widen. "I didn't know I was a witch until I got my letter. I didn't know my parents were a witch and wizard until then either. So stop asking questions that I don't know the answer to. This is all new for me and I really would like to have this day end on a happy note."

Heather's teeth had sharpened against her will and were now long fangs. Her voice was now laced with a wolf snarl and her pupils shrank dangerously. The boy seemed to shrink back as well, which satisfied Heather and Blue and Hige. But then his ego inflated again and he carried on like the sudden change never happened.

"What's your surname anyway?"

Before Heather could answer, Madam Malkin said, "That's you done, my dear," and Heather, not sorry for an excuse to stop talking to the boy, hopped down from the footstool. She walked out with Hige and blue following her. Blue turned back at the boy and snarled, flashing her fangs at the boy, startling him and nearly making him fall off the stool. Heather and Blue giggled on the way out.

"Well, I'll see you at Hogwarts, I suppose," said the drawling boy.

Once outside and regrouped, the pack settled down and ate the food that Hagrid brought them. They had all put Heather's school supplies in the magic bag that was tied around her neck. Heather then remembered something.

"Hey Hagrid, what's Quidditch?"

"Blimey Heather, I keep forgettin' how little yeh know-not knowin' about Quidditch?"

"Now doesn't that make me feel warm and fuzzy?" Heather said sarcastically. She then proceeded to tell Hagrid about the boy in the robe shop. He quickly went down on Tsume's, Kiba's and Toboe's list of favorite people to.

"Well, I 'ave no doubt he'll be in Slytherin." Hagrid said darkly.

"So what is Quidditch?" Toboe asked.

"It's our sport. Wizard sport. It's like-like soccer in the muggle world-everyone follows Quidditch-played up in the air on broomsticks and there's four balls-sorta hard ter explain the rules."

"And what are Slytherin and Hufflepuff?" Heather asked.

"School houses. There's four. Everyone says Hufflepuff are a lot o' duffers, but that's not true. They are very friendly an' loyal. You'd be better off in Hufflepuff then Slytherin. There's not a single witch or wizard who went bad who wasn't in Slytherin. You-Know-Who was one."

"Who's You-Know-Who?" Kiba asked.

Hagrid paled. "He was the darkest wizard in our recen' history. He did a lot of bad things, including murderin' yer parents Heather." Hagrid took out a Kleenex and whipped his eyes.

"What was his name?" Heather asked, curious of who killed her parents.

"V-V-V-Voldemort," Hagrid shuddered. "Don' make me say it again. Anyway, when he tried ter kill ya, something amazin' happened. The curse bounced back and Voldemort was killed. Though I don' believe it. Probably out there somewhere, bidin' his time."

"So, I'm famous for doing something when I was one year old?" Heather asked, Hagrid nodded. "I was one year old! All I did was scream, wet myself and think 'what the heck is going on?'" Heather said. She was a little disappointed, she would like to have actually been famous for actually doing something, not just sitting there and having getting hit in the head with a rebounding curse. "Anyways, Voldemort went to Hogwarts?"

"Don' say that name an' yes he did, years an' years ago."

"Why can't she say his name?" Tsume asked.

"People are still afraid." Hagrid said. Tsume laughed.

"Lame, humans, scared of saying someone's name?" Heather laughed a little as well.

"Until he suddenly pops up behind me when I say 'Voldemort', I'll say it till my heart's content." Heather declared, her chin held high with an air of defiance.

"Well, let's go get yer wand then." Hagrid said, standing up. "Oh-an I still have to get ya a present."

"Hagrid, you don't need to do that."

"I know I don't have to. Tell yeh what, I'll get yer animal. Not a toad, toads went outta fashion years ago, yeh'd be laughed at-an' I don't like cats, they make me sneeze. I'll get yer an owl. All the kids want owls, they're dead useful, can carry yer mail an' everythin.'"

Twenty minutes later, they left the Eeylops Owl Emporium, which had been dark and full of rustling and flickering, jewel bright eyes. Heather now carried a large cage that held a very beautiful snowy owl, fast asleep with her head under her wing. Heather had named her Cheza, in honor of the Flower Maiden that had persuaded Kiba to keep her. The pack smiled warmly at the name and then they became lost in memories.

"Just Ollivanders left now-only place fer wands, Ollivanders, and yeh gotta have the best wand."

The last shop was narrow and shabby. Peeling gold letters over the door read Ollivanders: Maker of Fine Wands since 382 B.C. A single wand lay on a faded purple cushion in the dusty window.

A tinkling bell rang somewhere inside the depths of the shop as they stepped in. It was a tiny place; empty except for a single spindly chair that Hagrid sat on to wait. Heather felt strangely as though she had entered a very strict library; she had swallowed a lot of new questions that had just occurred to her and looked instead at the thousands of narrow boxes piled tightly and neatly right up to the ceiling. For some reason, the back of her neck prickled. The very dust and silence in here seemed to prickle with some secret magic.

"Good afternoon," said a soft voice. Heather jumped. Hagrid must have jumped too, because there was a loud crunching and he quickly got off the spindly chair.

An old man was standing before them, his wide, pale eyes shined like moons through the gloom of the shop.

"Hello," said Heather.

"Ah yes. Yes, yes, I thought I'd be seeing you soon Heather Potter. You have your mother's looks. It seems only yesterday she was in here herself, buying her first wand. Ten and a quarter inches long, swishy, made of willow. Nice for charm work. Your father, on the other hand, favored a mahogany wand. Eleven inches. Pliable. A little more power and excellent for transfiguration. Well I say your father favored it- it's really the wand that chooses the wizard of course."

He then came really close to Heather, which made her feel uncomfortable. He pointed to her lightning shaped scar. "And that's where, I'm sorry to say I sold the wand that did it. Thirteen and a half inches. Yew. Powerful wand, very powerful, and in the wrong hands…well, if I'd known what that wand was going out into the world to do…" He shook his head and then, to Heather's relief spotter Hagrid.

"Rubeus! Rubeus Hagrid! How nice to see you again…Oak, sixteen inches, rather bender, wasn't it?"

"It was, sir, yes," said Hagrid.

"Good wand that one. But I suppose they snapped it in half when you got expelled?" said Mr. Ollivander, suddenly very stern.

"Er-yes, they did, yes," said Hagrid, shuffling his feet. Heather looked at him curiously. What had he done to get expelled? "I've still got the pieces, though," he added brightly.

"But you don't _use _them?" said Mr. Ollivander sharply.

"Oh, no, sir," said Hagrid quickly. Heather noticed he gripped his pink umbrella very tightly as he spoke.

"Hmmm," said Mr. Ollivander, giving Hagrid a piercing look. "Well now-Ms. Potter. Let me see." He pulled a long tape measurer with silver markings out of his pocket. "Which is your wand arm?" Heather guessed it was the same as the hand you write with so she held out her right arm.

"That's it." He measured Heather from shoulder to finger, then wrist to elbow, shoulder to the floor, knee to armpit and round her head. As he measured, he said, "Every Ollivander wand has a core of a powerful magical substance, Ms. Potter. We use unicorn hairs, phoenix tail feathers, and the heartstrings of dragons. No two Ollivander wands are the same, just as no two unicorns, dragons or phoenixes are quite the same. And of course, you will never get such good results with another wizard's wand."

Heather then suddenly realized that the tape measure, which was measuring between her nostrils, was doing this on its own. Mr. Ollivander was flitting around the shelves, taking down boxes.

"That will do," he said, and the tape measurer crumpled into a heap on the floor. "Right then, Ms. Potter. Try this one. Beech wood and dragon heartstring. Nine inches, nice and flexible. Just take it and give it a wave."

Heather did so while feeling like an idiot. Mr. Ollivander snatched it out of her hand almost at once.

"Maple and phoenix feather. Seven inches. Quite whippy. Try-"

Heather tried-but she hardly raised the wand when it, too, was snatched back by Mr. Ollivander.

"No, no-here, ebony and unicorn hair, eight and a half inches, springy. Go on, go on, try it out."

Heather tried, and tried. She had no idea what Mr. Ollivander was waiting for. The pile of wands was mounting higher and higher on the spindly chair, but the more wands Mr. Ollivander pulled from the shelves, the happier he seemed to become.

"Tricky customer, eh? Not to worry, we'll find the perfect match he somewhere-I, wonder, now-yes, why not-an unusual combination-holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple."

Heather took the wand. She felt a sudden warmth in her fingers. She raised the wand above her head, brought it swishing down through the dusty air and a stream of red and gold sparks sot from the end like a firework, throwing dancing spots of light on to the walls. Hagrid and the pack whooped and clapped and Mr. Ollivander cried, "Oh bravo! Yes indeed, of very good. Well, well, well…how curious…how very curious…"

He put Heather's wand back into its box and wrapped in it brown paper, still muttering "Curious…curious."

"Sorry." Said Heather, "But what's curious?"

Mr. Ollivander fixed Heather with his pale stare.

"I remember every wand I've ever sold, Ms. Potter. Every single wand. It so happens that the phoenix whose tail feather is in you wand, gave another feather-just one other. It is very curious indeed that you should be destined for this wand when it's brother-why its brother gave you that scar."

Heather blinked.

"Yes, thirteen and a half inches. Yew. Curious indeed how these things happen. The wand chooses the wizard, remember…I think we must expect great things from you, Ms. Potter…after all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things-terrible, yes, but great."

Heather thought of this. What would she be able to do? Well she guessed she was going to find out. She paid for her wand and walked out with everyone else.

Now standing outside of the mansion, Hagrid said goodbye to Heather. He then handed her an envelope. "Yer ticket fer Hogwarts," he said, "First o' September-King's Cross-it's all in yer ticket. See yeh soon everybody." Hagrid jumped into his motorcycle and took off.

Now the pack stared at their new home. It would need a lot of work but this was their new home. Heather was smiling all ready. The pack walked into the mansion and then went their separate ways and began dusting off dust and cobwebs.


	4. Journey to Platform 9 & Three Quarters

**The Red Wolf and the Sorcerer's Stone Ch. 3**

**I own nothing but my OC's. I want to thank all of you who reviewed. That makes me motivated to write. Keep it up.**

Heather's room was a whole lot cleaner. In fact, the entire mansion was. She had dusted off everything and cleaned the windows. She had unpacked everything and gotten settled down. Her bed was fixed with midnight blue covers and curtains around her bed and window to the balcony. The chandelier worked now and the vanity was fixed up. She had a dresser next to the vanity, a bathroom right next door, a few bean bag/large pillows scattered around the room, a large rug in the center, a desk and a bookshelf. She was doing pretty well for herself. Now she also owned an iPod for when she got bored.

Heather was lying sprawled out across the covers, reading her potions book. Her hair was spread out against the comforter, blood red against night sky blue. Learning these plants would definitely help her in the forest. Recently she had used Cheza to send a letter to the Headmaster, asking if she could hunt for her food. She wasn't used to being around humans, never mind going to school with them, eating with them and sleeping with them.

After reading a few chapters Heather closed the book and slipped in her magic bag that was still around her neck. She then hopped out of bed and ran down stairs. The main room was just down the stone hall they had the staircase that led up to her room. The halls were all stone with candles lit along the way to provide light. The windows were stained glass that when light shined through the pattern would reflect on the floor.

She ran down to the main room, which consisted of a coffee table in front of a large TV. Behind the table was one of those really long couches, plenty of room for the pack and several others. The entire mansion was fixed up because Toboe was the luckiest wolf ever. He found a lottery ticket floating around and figured he'd turn it in and low and behold, he won $250,000! It was used to restore the mansion to its former glory, with a modern twist. The bedrooms that weren't used were cleaned up, ready for future pack mates to come in and customize them.

Once Heather was down in the main room she saw Kiba and Toboe lounging around. "I'm going out for a walk, maybe hunt. I'm just going around the territory." The two nodded

She opened the door and stepped out and then Heather shifted into her wolf form. She ran out into the forest. The sweet smells of prey and trickling streams hit her nose. She loved it here. In a few days however she would be leaving for Hogwarts. She wouldn't be as social as many would expect the girl who lived to be. Heather planned on being a wallflower with a friend here or there, a simple time and then returning to the forest, where she belonged, wild and free.

There were several things she wasn't looking forward to. No running, always sitting still and not knowing how to defend herself against magic. Heather didn't care if there would be people that were angry at her savage behavior if someone threatened her. They needed to grow up. The wild is a harsh place. Humans hunt only for sport, wolves hunt to survive. The wild, is kill or be killed, hunt or starve, there is no room for softhearted weaklings. True, wolves could accept outsiders into the pack, but, if Heather were to snap someone's neck who was trying to kill someone, she didn't want to be scolded for having blood drip from her jaws and her fangs being stained red. In the wild, the strong survive and the weak perish.

But some of the things she would be looking forward to would be exploring her surroundings, learning new things, learning new ways to fight and most importantly, frightening other students. Madam Malkin had charmed her robes so that Heather could let her tail pop out any time she wanted. That would definitely keep people away, but if that doesn't keep them away then a mouthful of fangs would.

Heather ran all the way to the border of the territory, where you could see rolling hills and London out in the distance. Heather felt the wind run through her fur. She took a deep breath. There were the sweet scents that she loved so much, but there was something new.

There was the scent of age, and with it, not mingling but next to it, a concentrated scent of herbs. But there was a scent that was with both of them a scent that made Heather instantly become territorial. It made her ears go forwards, her tail go erect, her fur stand on end and her lips pull back, revealing her fangs and making her growl.

Heather glared and took off towards the scent, it wasn't far. Her white paws blazed over the grass and she ran towards the two intruders. Quickly Heather saw two she-wolves come into view. Snarling Heather pounced on the nearest intruder. She was a thin blue grey wolf, scars all over her face, black rimmed ears, white inner ears, light grey streaks from age, slightly lighter blue throat and belly, brown eyes. Bones stuck out from under her pelt.

"What are you doing here?" Heather snarled.

"I-I-I…" The old she-wolf stammered.

"We've been meaning to join a pack." A younger voice said from behind Heather.

Heather turned her head to get a good look at the other intruder. She definitely looked …intricate. She was a white wolf with dark grey flame patterned socks and diamond on her forehead, light grey ears, stripes along her back, upper legs, back of her neck and eye markings, and purple eyes. On each ear she had two gold studs, a cuff and a hoop earring. On the hoop earring on her left ear she had two light brown feathers and two slightly smaller black raven feathers. She also had two gold bangles on each of her fore paws and a bird skull necklace. She looked about the same age as Tsume.

"What?" Heather growled, making sure she heard correctly.

"We've been meaning to join a pack." The bejeweled wolf said calmly. "My name is Blaze and the she-wolf underneath you is Mary. We've been wandering around to join a pack, so when we smelled the scent marking bordering this territory we figured we should go and ask to join."

Heather thought for a moment, and then made the most logical decision. "I don't have the power, but I will call the wolves that do." Heather lifted her head to the sky and howled for Kiba and Tsume to come.

In a matter of moments the two wolves came running towards her with postures of a wolf's dominance. Heather shifted into a partially submissive stance. Heather wasn't the submissive type but she submitted somewhat. She got off of Mary and flattened her ears against her head and let her tail droop.

"What is this?" Tsume snarled.

"These two wolves are hoping to join our pack." Heather said.

Kiba looked calmly at them, looking them over. "What can you offer us?"

Tsume glared at Kiba in disbelief that he would consider new members so soon but Kiba simply glanced at him. The Beta kept his jaws shut but he was still growling at the two she-wolves.

"You obviously can't hunt in your great age." Kiba said, flicking his head towards Mary.

Mary seemed to brighten. She leapt to her paws. "My name is Mary and I can look after pups and young ones while you're out hunting or patrolling the borders." Her tail was wagging.

"And I," Blaze began. "May not be the best hunter or fighter but I know everything there is when it comes to healing, from injuries to diseases to delivering pups."

Heather thought it was an okay idea to let them stay. A healer and a pup sitter, those were two things that the pack would need. Heather calmed down but was still wary. She would need to keep an eye on these females.

"Alright, I'll let you stay."

Heather ran towards London, it was September 1st and it was time to get to Hogwarts. Kiba was with her, to make sure she got on the train alright. Blaze and Mary had settled well into the pack. Mary was like a grandmother and she loved everyone. Blaze really did know how to treat everything. She treated Tsume when his pads were cracked, Heather when she got a thorn in her paw and Hige when he wretched a claw trying to catch a squirrel that ran up a tree. Blaze fixed up an infirmary for the injured. Although Tsume was still wary, more so about Blaze then Mary, considering that Blaze was young and strong and Mary was...not. They both at first didn't believe Heather's witch story, until she waved her wand and made sparks fly out of them.

Heather had gotten a letter back via owl, saying that she would be able to go into the forbidden forest to hunt and that any kills she wanted to save would be left with Hagrid before they became to…ripe. Soon both of them were in human for and in King's Cross Station. Heather had put Cheza back in her cage. On the run here she had put the cage in her magic bag and let her owl fly above them. Heather had her ticket in her hand. Heather had her hair drawn back in a low ponytail, torn jeans, a black t-shirt with a bedazzled skull with angel wings on it, leather jacket and crescent moon necklace.

"Ha! This is rich. It says Platform 9¾." Heather laughed.

"Let's hang around between platforms 9 and 10 and see if anyone else is going to this magic school."

The two wolves hung out between the platforms, eventually driven by boredom to play a game of I Spy. While Kiba was describing a train for the fifth time the two heard some woman speak.

"-Packed with muggles of course-" She said with annoyance.

The speaker was a plump woman talking to four boys, all with flaming red hair. Each of them was pushing a trunk and they had an owl.

"These are the ones we've been looking for." Heather said and the two wolves crept up behind them, observing them like they would prey.

"Now, what's he platform number?" said the boys' mother.

"9 ¾." piped a small girl, also red-headed, who was holding her hand, "Mom, can't I go…"

"You're not old enough, Ginny, now be quiet. All right, Percy, you go first."

What looked like to be the oldest boy walked up. He then ran towards the wall between platforms between 9 and 10. Heather was ready to see him crash but to her surprise he ran right through the wall and disappeared.

"Fred, you're next," the plump woman said.

"I'm not Fred, I'm George," said the boy. "Honestly woman, you call yourself our mother. Can't you tell I'm George?"

"Sorry, George, dear."

"Only joking, I am Fred." said the boy and off he went. His twin called after him to hurry up, and he did so because a second later he disappeared into the wall.

Now the third brother was walking briskly toward the barrier and ran right in.

Kiba and Heather looked at each other, shrugged and walked over to the family and stood behind them, waiting patiently in line. The mother of the large family must have noticed them. She turned around and smiled kindly at the two of them, as far as she was concerned, Kiba was still a child. Her heart must have really gone out to Kiba, considering the scars on his face.

"Hello, dears," she said. "First time at Hogwarts? Ron's new, too."

She pointed to the last and youngest of her sons. He was tall, thin, and gangling, with freckles, big hands and feet, and a long nose.

"Yes," said Kiba. "I'm dropping her off and then returning home." Kiba explained, in his usual emotionless voice, although he did have the tiniest smile on his lips when he looked down at Heather. This made her blush a little, and smile.

"Alright, well," the woman said. "Why don't you get onto the platform before Ron? Now don't worry that you'll crash, best to take a run at it."

"Okay." Heather said. She looked at Kiba and the two nodded.

With super wolf speed they both ran right into the wall. Heather was a little apprehensive, expecting to get injured by running into a wall, but that didn't happen. They kept running and came to another station. There was a scarlet steam engine that was waiting next to a platform packed with people. A sign overhead said Hogwarts Express, eleven o'clock. Heather looked behind her and saw a wrought-iron archway were the barrier had been, with the words Platform Nine and Three-Quarters on it, they did it.

Smoke from the engine drifted over the heads of the chattering crowd, while cats of every color wound here and there between their legs. Owls hooted to one another in a disgruntled sort of way over the babble and scraping of heavy trunks. Just then Cheza flew down and landed on Heather's shoulder. The green eyed girl smiled at her owl and gently scratched her underneath her chin like a cat. The owl churred happily.

Heather took her magic bag, opened it and took out Cheza's cage. The owl flew into the cage. While Kiba waited outside, Heather looked for a seat. The first few carriages were already packed with students, some hanging out the window to talk to their families, some fighting over seats which made Heather roll her eyes at their childishness. Heather walked down the platform with Cheza's cage, in search of an empty seat. She passed a round faced boy who was saying, "Gran, I've lost my toad again."

"Oh, Neville," she heard the old woman sigh.

A boy with dreadlocks was surrounded by a small crowd.

The boy lifted the lid of the box in his arms, and the people around him shrieked and yelled as something inside poked out a long hairy leg.

Heather pushed through the crowd until she found an empty compartment in the back of the train; she put Cheza in while Kiba waited outside.

"Want a hand?" It was one of the red-haired twins she'd followed through the barrier.

"No, I'm fine. I've got all my supplies in here." Heather said, pointing to the tiny bag tied around her neck. Heather then pushed her hair out of her face. The boy's jaw dropped when he saw her forehead.

"Who you talkin' to George?" The other twin walked over, his jaw dropped as well.

"What's that?" One of the twins asked, pointing to her forehead.

Heather pushed her hair out of her face again so that the two boys could see her lightning shaped scar.

"Blimey are you-?"

"She is, aren't you?"

"What?" Asked Heather.

"Heather Potter." The twins said together.

"Uh...yeah." Heather said.

The two twins continued to gawk at her and Heather was beginning to feel annoyed. Then, to her relief, a voice came floating through the train's open door.

"Fred, George, are you there?"

"Coming Mom."

With one last look at Heather the twins hopped off the train. Heather followed them so that she could go say goodbye to Kiba. She had mixed feelings about this, on one hand she was excited to learn magic and new ways to fight, on the other she was leaving her pack behind to go to a school for humans. Well, even if some of the humans find it amusing to harass her, she'll teach them that if you mess with her, they'll get a mouth full of fangs in their throat. Kiba walked over to her alpha with a smile.

"Guess I'll see you over Christmas vacation." Heather said.

"We'll keep you updated." Kiba promised and pulled the small girl into a hug. Heather smiled and hugged her alpha. When they pulled back they rubbed noses, the wolf's sign of showing affection. Heather giggled and Kiba smiled a tiny smile.

"I'll see you in a couple months." And with that he took off, through the barrier and back to the forest. Heather walked back onto the train and as she did, her wolf sense of hearing picked up on the conversation between the two twins and their mother. Once she was inside her compartment she looked out the window so that she could see the red haired family. The mother had just taken out a handkerchief.

"Ron, you've got something on your nose."

The youngest boy tried to jerk out of the way, but she grabbed him and then began rubbing the end of his nose.

"Mom- geroff." He wriggled free.

"Aaah, has ickle Ronnie got somefink on his nosie?" said one of the twins.

"Shut up," said Ron.

"Where's Percy?" said their mother.

"He's coming now."

The oldest boy came striding into sight. He had already changed into his billowing black Hogwarts robes, and Heather noticed a shining silver badge on his chest with the letter P on it.

"Can't stay long Mother," he said. "I'm up front; the prefects have got two compartments to themselves-"

"Oh, are you a prefect Percy?" said one of the twins, with an air of great surprise. "You should have said something, we had no idea."

"Hang on, I think I remember him saying something about it," said the other twin. "Once-"

"Or twice-"

"A minuet-"

"All summer-"

"Oh, shut up," said Percy the Prefect. Heather let out a small, quiet, amused laugh.

"How come Percy gets new robes anyway?" said one of the twins.

"Because he's a prefect." said their mother fondly. "All right, dear, well, have a good term – send me an owl when you get there."

She kissed Percy on the cheek and he left. Then she turned to the twins.

"Now you two – this year, you behave yourselves. If I get one more owl telling me you've – you've blown up a toilet or –"

"Blown up a toilet? We've never blown up a toilet."

"Great idea though, thanks Mom."

"It's not funny. And look after Ron."

"Don't worry; ickle Ronniekins is safe with us."

"Shut up," said Ron again. He was almost as tall as the twins already and his nose was still pink where his mother had rubbed it.

"Hey, Mom, guess what? Guess who we met on the train?"

Heather leaned back so that they couldn't see her looking. So much for a quiet, un disturbed time.

"You know the red-haired girl that was near us at the station with scarred faced boy? You know who she was?"

"Who?"

"Heather Potter!"

Heather heard the little girl's voice.

"Oh, Mom, can I go on the train and see her, Mom, oh please..."

"You've already seen her Ginny, and the poor girl isn't something you can goggle at in a zoo. Is she really Fred? How do you know?"

"Asked her. Saw her scar. It's really there-like lightning."

"Poor dear-she was ever so polite when she asked how to get onto the platform."

"Never mind that, do you think she remembers what You-Know-Who looks like?"

Now that Heather thought about it, she did remember a flash of bright green light. Paying attention again to the red head family she saw that the mother had become very stern.

"I forbid you to ask her Fred. No, don't you dare. As though she needs reminding of that on her first day of school."

"Alright, keep your hair on."

A whistle sounded.

Heather went back to her compartment and settled down for the ride. She gently stroked Cheza's head as she got lost in her thoughts. Goodbye forest, hello magic school. Well, Heather could always use Cheza to communicate with her pack mates. The door of her compartment slid open and the youngest red head boy came in.

"Anyone sitting there?" he asked, pointing at the seat opposite Heather. "Everywhere else is full."

Heather shook her head and the boy sat down. He glanced at Heather and then looked quickly out of the window, pretending he hadn't looked. Heather saw he still had a black mark on his nose.

"Hey, Ron."

The twins were back.

"Listen, we're going down the middle of the train — Lee Jordan's got a giant tarantula down there."

"Right," mumbled Ron.

"Heather," said the other twin, "did we introduce ourselves? Fred and George Weasley. And this is Ron, our brother. See you later, then."

"Bye," said Heather and Ron. The twins slid the compartment door shut behind them.

"Are you really Heather Potter?" Ron blurted out.

Heather nodded.

"Oh — well, I thought it might be one of Fred and George's jokes," said Ron. "And have you really got — you know…"

He pointed at Heather's forehead.

Heather pulled back her bangs to show the lightning scar. Ron stared.

"So that's where You-Know-Who —?"

"Yes," said Heather, "but I can't remember it."

"Nothing?" said Ron eagerly.

"Well — I remember a lot of green light, but nothing else."

"Wow," said Ron. He sat and stared at Heather for a few moments, then, as though he had suddenly realized what he was doing, he looked quickly out of the window again.

"Are all your family wizards?" asked Heather, who was curious about this boy who had been here all his life. She would have lived here to, had her parents not been killed.

"Er — Yes, I think so," said Ron. "I think Mum's got a second cousin who's an accountant, but we never talk about him."

"So you must know some magic already."

The Weasleys were clearly one of those old wizarding families the pale boy in Diagon Alley had talked about.

"I heard you went to live with Muggles," said Ron. "What are they like?"

"I don't know. They abandoned me, but don't worry, I wouldn't trade my current life for anything. What's it like, having three brothers?" Heather asked

"Five," said Ron. For some reason, he was looking gloomy.

"I'm the sixth in our family to go to Hogwarts. You could say I've got a lot to live up to. Bill and Charlie have already left — Bill was head boy and Charlie was captain of Quidditch. Now Percy's a prefect. Fred and George mess around a lot, but they still get really good marks and everyone thinks they're really funny. Everyone expects me to do as well as the others, but if I do, it's no big deal, because they did it first.

You never get anything new, either, with five brothers. I've got Bill's old robes, Charlie's old wand, and Percy's old rat."

Ron reached inside his jacket and pulled out a fat gray rat, which was asleep.

"His name's Scabbers and he's useless, he hardly ever wakes up. Percy got an owl from my dad for being made a prefect, but they couldn't aff — I mean, I got Scabbers instead."

Ron's ears went pink. He seemed to think he'd said too much, because he went back to staring out of the window. Heather didn't think there was anything wrong with not being able to afford an owl. After all, she'd never had any money in her life until a month ago (not that she needed it), and she told Ron so, all about how she had found out she was a witch

"… and until Hagrid told me, I didn't know anything about being a witch or about my parents or Voldemort—"

Ron gasped.

"What?" asked Heather.

"You said You-Know-Who's name!" said Ron, sounding both shocked and impressed. "I'd have thought you, of all people —"

"I'm not trying to be brave or anything, saying the name," said Harry, "I just think it's stupid to fear saying a name. I'm going to say it as much as I want."

While they had been talking, the train had carried them out of London. Now they were speeding past fields full of cows and sheep. They were quiet for a time, watching the fields and lanes flick past.

Around half past twelve there was a great clattering outside in the corridor and a smiling, dimpled woman slid back their door and said, "Anything off the cart, dears?"

Heather, who hadn't had any breakfast, leapt to her feet, but Ron's ears went pink again and he muttered that he'd brought sandwiches. Heather went out into the corridor.

She had never had any money for candy, she never needed it, and now that he had pockets rattling with gold and silver he was ready to buy some candy and try some. The lady had Bettie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, Drooble's Best Blowing Gum, Chocolate Frogs, Pumpkin Pasties, Cauldron Cakes, Licorice Wands, and a number of other strange things Heather had never seen in her life. Not wanting to miss anything, she got some of everything and paid the woman eleven silver Sickles and seven bronze Knuts.

Ron stared as Heather brought it all back in to the compartment and tipped it onto an empty seat. "Hungry, are you?"

"Starving," said Heather, taking a large bite out of a pumpkin pasty.

Ron had taken out a lumpy package and unwrapped it. There were four sandwiches inside. He pulled one of them apart and said, "She always forgets I don't like corned beef…"

"Swap you for one of these," said Heather, holding up a pasty. "Go on —"

"You don't want this, it's all dry," said Ron. "She hasn't got much time," he added quickly, "you know, with five of us."

"Go on, have a pasty," said Heather, who had always had anything and everything with her pack mates. Heather had eaten the sandwich, it was dry but it was definitely really good.

"What are these?" Heather asked Ron, holding up a pack of Chocolate Frogs.

"They're not really frogs, are they?" She was starting to feel that nothing would surprise her. If they really were frogs though, she wouldn't mind. Frogs were actually pretty good, chewy.

"No," said Ron. "But see what the card is. I'm missing Agrippa."

"What?"

"Oh, of course, you wouldn't know — Chocolate Frogs have cards, inside them, you know, to collect — famous witches and wizards. I've got about five hundred, but I haven't got Agrippa or Ptolemy."

Heather unwrapped her Chocolate Frog and picked up the card. It showed a man's face. He wore half-moon glasses, had a long, crooked nose, and flowing silver hair, beard, and mustache. Underneath the picture was the name Albus Dumbledore.

"So this is Dumbledore!" said Heather.

"Don't tell me you'd never heard of Dumbledore!" said Ron. "Can I have a frog? I might get Agrippa — thanks —"

Heather turned over her card and read:

_ALBUS DUMBLEDORE_

_CURRENTLY HEADMASTER OF HOGWARTS_

_Considered by many the greatest wizard of modern times, Dumbledore is particularly famous for his defeat of the dark wizard Grindelwald in 1945, for the discovery of the twelve uses of dragon's blood, and his work on alchemy with his partner, Nicolas Flamel. Professor Dumbledore enjoys chamber music and tenpin bowling._

It was good to know about the headmaster, who would basically be like the alpha in Heather's situation. Heather turned the card back over and saw, to her astonishment, that Dumbledore's face had disappeared.

"He's gone!"

"Well, you can't expect him to hang around all day," said Ron. "He'll be back. No, I've got Morgana again and I've got about six of her… do you want it? You can start collecting."

Ron's eyes strayed to the pile of Chocolate Frogs waiting to be unwrapped. "Help yourself," said Heather. "But in, you know, the Muggle world, people just stay put in photos."

"Do they? What, they don't move at all?" Ron sounded amazed. "Weird!"

Heather stared as Dumbledore sidled back into the picture on his card and gave her a small smile. Ron was more interested in eating the frogs than looking at the Famous Witches and Wizards cards, but Heather couldn't keep her eyes off them. Soon she had not only Dumbledore and Morgana, but Hengist of Woodcroft, Alberic Grunnion, Circe, Paracelsus, and Merlin. It was great to be learning about all these characters, to know what some of the best witches and wizards could do. She finally tore her eyes away from the Druidess Cliodna, who was scratching her nose, to open a bag of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans.

"You want to be careful with those," Ron warned Heather. "When they say every flavor, they mean every flavor — you know, you get all the ordinary ones like chocolate and peppermint and marmalade, but then you can get spinach and liver and tripe. George reckons he had a booger-flavored one once."

Ron picked up a green bean, looked at it carefully, and bit into a corner.

"Bleaaargh — see? Sprouts."

"Wait a second, how does your brother know it was booger flavored?" Heather said, raising an eyebrow with an amused smile on her face. Ron snickered.

Every Flavor Beans. Heather got toast, coconut, steak, baked bean, strawberry, curry, grass, frog, coffee, sardine, and was even brave enough to nibble the end of a funny gray one Ron wouldn't touch, which turned out to be pepper.

The countryside now flying past the window was becoming wilder. The neat fields had gone. Now there were woods, twisting rivers, and dark green hills.

There was a knock on the door of their compartment and the round-faced boy Heather had passed on platform nine and three-quarters came in. He looked tearful.

"Sorry," he said, "but have you seen a toad at all?"

When they shook their heads, he wailed, "I've lost him! He keeps getting away from me!"

"He'll turn up," said Heather.

"Yes," said the boy miserably. "Well, if you see him…"

He left.

"Don't know why he's so bothered," said Ron. "If I'd brought a toad I'd lose it as quick as I could. Mind you, I brought Scabbers, so I can't talk."

The rat was still snoozing on Ron's lap.

"He might have died and you wouldn't know the difference," said Ron in disgust. "I tried to turn him yellow yesterday to make him more interesting, but the spell didn't work. I'll show you, look…"

He rummaged around in his trunk and pulled out a very battered-looking wand. It was chipped in places and something white was glinting at the end.

"Unicorn hair's nearly poking out. Anyway —"

He had just raised his wand when the compartment door slid open again. The toadless boy was back, but this time he had a girl with him. She was already wearing her new Hogwarts robes.

"Has anyone seen a toad? Neville's lost one," she said. She had a bossy sort of voice, lots of bushy brown hair, and rather large front teeth.

"We've already told him we haven't seen it," said Ron, but the girl wasn't listening, she was looking at the wand in his hand.

"Oh, are you doing magic? Let's see it, then."

She sat down. Ron looked taken aback. Heather was a little also. "So forward." She thought.

"Er — all right."

He cleared his throat.

'Sunshine, daisies, butter mellow, Turn this stupid, fat rat yellow.'

He waved his wand, but nothing happened. Scabbers stayed gray and fast asleep.

"Are you sure that's a real spell?" said the girl. "Well, it's not very good, is it? I've tried a few simple spells just for practice and it's all worked for me. Nobody in my family's magic at all, it was ever such a surprise when I got my letter, but I was ever so pleased, of course, I mean, it's the very best school of witchcraft there is, I've heard — I've learned all our course books by heart, of course, I just hope it will be enough — I'm Hermione Granger, by the way, who are you?"

She said all this very fast.

Heather was surprised this girl could all that in one breath.

"I'm Ron Weasley," Ron muttered.

"Heather Potter," said Heather.

"Are you really?" said Hermione.

"I know all about you, of course — I got a few extra books, for background reading, and you're in Modern Magical History and The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts and Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century."

"I am?" said Heather.

"Goodness, didn't you know, I'd have found out everything I could if it was me," said Hermione. "Do either of you know what house you'll be in? I've been asking around, and I hope I'm in Gryffindor, it sounds by far the best; I hear Dumbledore himself was in it, but I suppose Ravenclaw wouldn't be too bad… Anyway, we'd better go and look for Neville's toad. You two had better change, you know, I expect we'll be there soon."

And she left, taking the toadless boy with her.

"Whatever house I'm in, I hope she's not in it," said Ron. He threw his wand back into his trunk. 'Stupid spell — George gave it to me, bet he knew it was a dud.'

"What house are your brothers in" asked Heather.

"Gryffindor," said Ron. Gloom seemed to be settling on him again. "Mom and Dad were in it, too. I don't know what they'll say if I'm not. I don't suppose Ravenclaw would be too bad, but imagine if they put me in Slytherin."

"That's the house Voldemort was in?"

"Yeah," said Ron after he flinched. He flopped back into his seat, looking depressed.

"You know, I think the ends of Scabbers' whiskers are a bit lighter," said Heather, trying to take Ron's mind off houses.

"So what do your oldest brothers do now that they've left, anyway?" Heather was wondering what a wizard did once he'd finished school.

"Charlie's in Romania studying dragons, and Bill's in Africa doing something for Gringotts," said Ron.

"Did you hear about Gringotts? It's been all over the Daily Prophet, but I don't suppose you get that with the Muggles — someone tried to rob a high security vault."

Heather stared. "Really? What happened to them?"

"Nothing, that's why it's such big news. They haven't been caught. My dad says it must've been a powerful Dark wizard to get round Gringotts, but they don't think they took anything, that's what's odd. 'Course, everyone gets scared when something like this happens in case You-Know-Who's behind it."

Heather turned this news over in her mind. She might have underestimated Voldemort. Obviously he is, or was a tough cookie. But still, fear of saying a name? Ridiculous.

"What's your Quidditch team?" Ron asked.

"I don't know any." Heather said.

"What!" Ron looked dumbfounded. "Oh, you wait, it's the best game in the world —" And he was off, explaining all about the four balls and the positions of the seven players, describing famous games he'd been to with his brothers and the broomstick he'd like to get if he had the money. He was just taking Heather through the finer points of the game when the compartment door slid open yet again, but it wasn't Neville the toadless boy or Hermione Granger this time.

Three boys entered, and Heather recognized the middle one at once: it was the pale boy from Madam Malkin's robe shop. He was looking at Heather with a lot more interest than he'd shown back in Diagon Alley.

"Is it true?" he said. "They're saying all down the train that Heather Potter's in this compartment. So it's you, is it?"

"Yes," said Heather. She was looking at the other boys. Both of them were thickset and looked extremely mean. Standing on either side of the pale boy, they looked like bodyguards. 'Alpha and his two betas,' Heather thought, that's what the small trio seemed like.

"Oh, this is Crabbe and this is Goyle," said the pale boy carelessly, noticing where Heather was looking. "And my name's Malfoy, Draco Malfoy."

Ron gave a slight cough, which might have been hiding a snigger. Draco Malfoy looked at him. Heather glared at Ron from the corner of her eye, he shouldn't have laughed at his name but she said nothing.

"Think my name's funny, do you? No need to ask who you are. My father told me all the Weasleys have red hair, freckles, and more children than they can afford." He turned back to Heather. "You'll soon find out some wizarding families are much better than others, Potter. You don't want to go making friends with the wrong sort. I can help you there." He held out his hand to shake Heather's, but Heather didn't take it.

"I think I can tell who the wrong sort are for myself, thanks," she said coolly.

Draco Malfoy didn't go red, but a pink tinge appeared in his pale cheeks.

"I'd be careful if I were you, Potter," he said slowly. "Unless you're a bit politer you'll go the same way as your parents. They didn't know what was good for them, either. You hang around with riffraff like the Weasleys and that Hagrid, and it'll rub off on you."

Heather stood up. Ron was about to get up but Heather gave him a warning glare. He listened but had a small childish pout on his face. "Look. I don't give a crap about your opinions. So get out of here or I'm going to break you down into so many little pieces that 80 year old Mary, who can do a thousand piece puzzle of clear blue sky in less than an hour will never be able to finish putting you guys back together again. Even if she goes back in time to when her vision was perfect." She growled, a faint wolf growl hidden behind her voice.

"Oh, you're going to fight us, are you?" Malfoy sneered.

"Unless you get out now," said Heather.

"But we don't feel like leaving, do we, boys? We've eaten all our food and you still seem to have some."

Goyle reached toward the Chocolate Frogs next to Ron — Ron leapt forward, but before he'd so much as touched Goyle, Goyle let out a horrible yell. Heather grabbed Goyle's wrist and bent it back really hard. She then kicked his feet out from under him. Goyle fell to the ground with a loud thud. Crabbe tried to punch Heather in the face but she grabbed his fist in a rock solid grip. Heather then kicked Crabbe's legs out from under him like she did Goyle and idiot number two fell down on to idiot number one. Malfoy was now the only one left. Heather simply grew her fangs barred her wolf teeth and snarled. Malfoy turn tailed and ran, Goyle and Crabbe following soon after. Heather sat back down with a smug smile on her face. Ron had a huge smile on his face.

"What the bloody hell are you?" He laughed.

"A girl who can kick some serious ass." Heather smirked, making Ron laughed again.

"You've met Malfoy before?" he asked.

Heather explained about their meeting in Diagon Alley.

"I've heard of his family," said Ron darkly. "They were some of the first to come back to our side after You-Know-Who disappeared. Said they'd been bewitched. My dad doesn't believe it. He says Malfoy's father didn't need an excuse to go over to the Dark Side."

He turned to Hermione. "Can we help you with something?"

"You'd better hurry up and put your robes on, I've just been up to the front to ask the conductor, and he says we're nearly there. You haven't been fighting, have you? You'll be in trouble before we even get there!"

"Would you mind leaving while we change?" said Ron, scowling at her.

"All right — I only came in here because people outside are behaving very childishly, racing up and down the corridors," said Hermione in a sniffy voice. "And you've got dirt on your nose, by the way, did you know?"

Ron glared at her as she left. Heather peered out of the window. It was getting dark. He could see mountains and forests under a deep purple sky. The train did seem to be slowing down. Heather went into the bathroom on the train and changed into her school robes. Heather double checked to see if the charm Madam Malkin used worked. She grew her ears on top of her head and her tail popped out, sticking out from her robes like there was a hole, showing off for the world to see. She quickly hid them again and walked back to her compartment.

A voice echoed through the train: "We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes' time. Please leave your luggage on the train; it will be taken to the school separately."

Ron, she saw, looked pale under his freckles. They crammed their pockets with the last of the sweets and joined the crowd thronging the corridor.

The train slowed right down and finally stopped. People pushed their way toward the door and out on to a tiny, dark platform. Heather breathed in the cold night air. Then a lamp came bobbing over the heads of the students, and Heather heard a familiar voice: "Firs' years! Firs' years over here! All right there, Heather?"

Hagrid's big hairy face beamed over the sea of heads.

"C'mon, follow me — any more firs' years? Mind yer step, now! Firs' years follow me!"

Slipping and stumbling, they followed Hagrid down what seemed to be a steep, narrow path. It was so dark on either side of them that Harry thought there must be thick trees there. Nobody spoke much. Neville, the boy who kept losing his toad, sniffed once or twice.

"Yeh'll get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec,' Hagrid called over his shoulder, 'jus' round this bend here."

There was a loud "Oooooh!"

The narrow path had opened suddenly onto the edge of a great black lake. Perched atop a high mountain on the other side, its windows sparkling in the starry sky, was a vast castle with many turrets and towers.

"No more'n four to a boat!" Hagrid called, pointing to a fleet of little boats sitting in the water by the shore. Heather and Ron were followed into their boat by Neville and Hermione.

"Everyone in?" shouted Hagrid, who had a boat to himself. "Right then — FORWARD!"

And the fleet of little boats moved off all at once, gliding across the lake, which was as smooth as glass. Everyone was silent, staring up at the great castle overhead. It towered over them as they sailed nearer and nearer to the cliff on which it stood.

"Heads down!" yelled Hagrid as the first boats reached the cliff; they all bent their heads and the little boats carried them through a curtain of ivy that hid a wide opening in the cliff face. They were carried along a dark tunnel, which seemed to be taking them right underneath the castle, until they reached a kind of underground harbor, where they clambered out onto rocks and pebbles.

"Oy, you there! Is this your toad?" said Hagrid, who was checking the boats as people climbed out of them.

"Trevor!" cried Neville blissfully, holding out his hands. Then they clambered up a passageway in the rock after Hagrid's lamp, coming out at last onto smooth, damp grass right in the shadow of the castle.

They walked up a flight of stone steps and crowded around the huge, oak front door.

"Everyone here? You there, still got yer toad?"

Hagrid raised a gigantic fist and knocked three times on the castle door.

**Attention everyone. I am in need of some Wolf OC's for Kiba's pack. Now, you can't all show up at once. You cannot show up in book 6 or 7, you have to arrive before hand. Send me a PM with your character info, here is the needed info. I already have Hige's and Blue's pups created so no relation to them.**

**Name: (Nicknames included)**

**Age: Old, young, pup, middle**

**Gender:**

**Blood: Wolf 50% wolf**

**Wolf Appearance:**

**Human Appearance:**

**Family:**

**Mate:**

**Pups:**

**Personality:**

**What Room looks like:**

**Genre of music: In my world wolves howl in a sorrowful tune when they mourn the dead but otherwise they sing so, give me some genre or list of songs.**

**When and how they join the pack:**

**Brief history:**

**Any other info? Do they have a crush, best friend? Do they argue with someone in the pack a lot:**

**HERE ARE THE WOVES I HAVE SO FAR**

**Name: Raven**

**Gender: Male**

**Age: Same age as Tsume**

**Wolf Appearance: Black wolf with white throat, cheeks, inner ears, eyebrow dots, tipped tail and circles around eyes. Yellow eyes. Nick in his right ear, three claw mark scar on his right cheek and dark grey pads and claws**

**Human Appearance: messy black hair, yellow eyes, tan skin, black leather jacket, ripped jeans, white t-shirt, combat boots.**

**Personality: Arrogant, a lot like Draco but he's not a bully, just a prankster, he is a real charmer. He is loyal to the pack and loves to show off.**

**Join the pack: He joins in the first book, he meets Heather and starts flirting with her when he runs into a hunting patrol, much to her annoyance. The wolves start chatting and Toboe brings up the option of staying, which Raven, excepts, much to Heather's frustration. **

**Name: Silver**

**Gender: Female**

**Age: Same as everyone**

**Wolf Appearance: Green eyes, silver fur, white throat, inner ear, chest, grey eye hook, dark grey streaks, tail tip, and a scar on her left foreleg**

**Human Appearance: Curly platinum blonde hair that goes just past her shoulder blades, green eyes, pale skin, light grey turtle neck sweater, jeans, brown boots with fuzzy tops.**

**Joining the pack: She was found, starving during spring break in fifth year, accidently stumbling onto their territory. It was Raven, who persuaded her to stay.**

**Personality: humble, shy and modest. She is easily embarrassed.**

**Name: Mary**

**Gender: Female**

**Age: Really old. Gonna die any day now.**

**Wolf Appearance: Thin blue grey wolf, scars all over her face, black rimmed ears, white inner ears, light grey streaks from age, slightly lighter blue throat and belly, brown eyes.**

**Human Appearance: Long straight white hair, white blouse, faded dark pink shawl, black flats and along black skirt.**

**Personality: Very loving, the classic sweet grandma character that bakes you cookies.**

**Name: Blaze**

**Gender: Female**

**Age: Middle Aged Medicine Wolf**

**Wolf Appearance: White wolf with dark grey flame patterned socks and diamond on her forehead, light grey ears, stripes along her back, upper legs, back of her neck and eye markings. Purple eyes. On each ear she has two gold studs, a cuff and a hoop earring. on the hoop earring on her left ear she has two light brown feathers and two slightly smaller black raven feathers. She also has two gold bangles on each of her fore paws and a bird skull necklace.**

**Human Appearance: Black long hair, a muted colored flowery long sleeved shirt, purple long skirt and black flats. She also has a blue button up jacket and she keeps all the jewelry she has on in her wolf form.**

**Personality: She is very blunt and tells people the way it is. **

**Name: Gean**

**Gender: Female**

**Age: Slightly older**

**Wolf Appearance: Light tan wolf with white mask, throat, belly, socks and inner ears. Brown ears, tail tip, collar marking around her neck and scruff and orange eyes. Three claw scratch on her belly. Brown nose**

**Human Appearance: Light brown hair, short green dress, black spandex pants, black outer layer and black flats.**

**Personality: She is very fair, protective and not quick to trust.**

**History: She join's Kiba's pack in the third book. She was running from small group of lone wolves with her pup when she was saved by some of Kiba's pack.**

**Name: Jack**

**Gender: Male**

**Age: Younger then Blue's pups**

**Wolf Appearance: Light tan like his mother, brow earn, white fore socks and back paws, one green eye, the other blind. A red dog collar with a circular tag.**

**Human Appearance: Brown hair, navy blue sweat shirt, jeans and black sneakers.**

**Personality: Very timid and easily frightened.**

**Name: Memphis**

**Gender: Male**

**Age: Heather's**

**Wolf Appearance: Like a German Shepherd**

**Human: Dark Brown hair and eyes, torn jeans, black high-tops, grey skull/dragon t-shirt, black biker jacket**

**Personality: Kind, loyal, a lot like Cedric Diggory but not quite as Hufflepuff considering he is not afraid to kill. He is Heather's best friend.**

**Join Pack: During Christmas break in the first book.**

**HERE ARE BLUE AND HIGE'S PUPS**

**October: Light brown male like Hige, with tan chest, paws, under-tail and a little gradient on his muzzle. Blue eyes and a dark grey collar with a bone on it. A lot like Hige, laid back and easy going. In human form he looks a lot like Hige but with Blue's spiky hair. He wears a white t-shirt, jeans, neon orange high tops and a graffiti hoodie.**

**December: Smallest pup, one blue and one brown eye. Dark blue like her mother, black gradient on her back, shoulders and tail tip. She has black ears, lion king like shadings by her eyes and white nose marking and inner ear. She has a string of black beads on her left paw. Quiet and soft spoken but very playful. She had shoulder length black hair, light skin and blue eyes. She wears jean shorts, a dark blue camo tank top, tennis shoes and a black sweat shirt. She really idolizes Heather and wants to be just like her.**

**May: Tan she-wolf with very light tan socks, under tail, muzzle, dot by either her eye brows and cheek, her throat, inner ear and a string of pink beads around her neck. Golden eyes. She is very girly but strives to do her best in fighting and hunting. She wears a pink tank top with a lacy collar and straps on it, jean shorts, pink sneakers and black fingerless gloves.**

**August: Dark gray wolf with black muzzle, nose and eye area, gradient on the back with flecks, white paws, chest, tip tail and inner ear. Black studded collar and dark brown eyes. He wears a black skull shirt, black jean jacket, dark jeans and black sneakers. He is very serious and doesn't talk or play much.**

**THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR FAVORITES, REVIEWS AND FOLLOWS. I LOVE YOU ALL!**


	5. The Sorting Hat

The door swung open at once. A tall, black-haired witch in emerald-green robes stood there. She had a very stern face and Heather's first thought was that you want to follow the rules especially when she was around.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," said Hagrid.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here."

She pulled the door wide. The entrance hall was enormous. The stone walls were lit with flaming torches like the ones at Gringotts, the ceiling was too high to make out, and a magnificent marble staircase facing them led to the upper floors.

They followed Professor McGonagall across the flagged stone floor. Harry could hear the drone of hundreds of voices from a doorway to the right — the rest of the school must already be here — but Professor McGonagall showed the first years into a small, empty chamber off the hall. They crowded in, standing rather closer together than they would usually have done, peering about nervously.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," said Professor McGonagall. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room. The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rule breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting."

Her eyes lingered for a moment on Neville's cloak, which was fastened under his left ear, and on Ron's smudged nose. Heather rolled her head around her shoulders, stretching it in a way.

"I shall return when we are ready for you," said Professor McGonagall. "Please wait quietly."

She left the chamber. Heather decided maybe now would be the time to reveal who she really was. She let her black rimmed ears grow on her head and her black tip tail to grow as well. She wagged her tail. There were several yelps of surprise. Heather smiled mischievously. Ron starred in shock at her ears, then her tail and then back at her ears.

"So this is why you suddenly had sharp teeth." Ron said, Heather smiled, showing off her fangs.

"I-wh-how?" Ron stuttered.

"I'll tell you later." Heather felt someone reaching out towards her tail. She pulled it out of reach. "Hey." Heather said, turning around. It was some boy with a look on his face like a little kid with his hand caught in the cookie jar. "Don't touch the tail." The boy retracted his hand. Heather turned back to Ron.

"How exactly do they sort us into houses?" she asked Ron.

He shook his head like he was coming out of a trance. "Some sort of test, I think. Fred said it hurts a lot, but I think he was joking."

Heather rolled this over in her head. A test? In front of the whole school? But no one here knew much magic yet—so obviously it wasn't a test. It couldn't be, the teachers wouldn't expect them to know stuff like that. No one was talking much except Hermione Granger, who was whispering very fast about all the spells she'd learned and wondering which one she'd need.

Heather tuned her out. She kept her eyes fixed on the door. Any second now, Professor McGonagall would come back and lead her to be sorted. Then something happened that made her jump about a foot in the air — several people behind her screamed.

"What the —?"

She gasped. So did the people around her. About twenty ghosts had just streamed through the back wall. Pearly-white and slightly transparent, they glided across the room talking to one another and hardly glancing at the first years. They seemed to be arguing. What looked like a fat little monk was saying: "Forgive and forget, I say, we ought to give him a second chance —"

"My dear Friar, haven't we given Peeves all the chances he deserves? He gives us all a bad name and you know, he's not really even a ghost — I say, what are you all doing here?" A ghost wearing a ruff and tights had suddenly noticed the first years.

"New students!" said the Fat Friar, smiling around at them. "About to be Sorted, I suppose?"

A few people nodded mutely.

"Hope to see you in Hufflepuff!" said the Friar. "My old house, you know."

Both of the ghosts noticed Heather and stared in shock at her ears and tail. She smiled up at them.

"Move along now," said a sharp voice. "The Sorting Ceremony's about to start."

Professor McGonagall had returned. One by one, the ghosts floated away through the opposite wall, not without casting one last glance at Heather.

"Now, form a line," Professor McGonagall told the first years, "and follow me."

Heather got into line behind a boy with sandy hair, with Ron behind her, and they walked out of the chamber, back across the hall, and through a pair of double doors into the Great Hall. Heather had never even imagined such a strange and amazing place.

It was lit by thousands and thousands of candles that were floating in midair over four long tables, where the rest of the students were sitting. These tables were laid with glittering golden plates and goblets. At the top of the hall was another long table where the teachers were sitting. Professor McGonagall led the first years up here, so that they came to a halt in a line facing the other students, with the teachers behind them. Everyone's eyes were on Heather's ears and tail. She held them high and with pride.

The hundreds of faces staring at them looked like pale lanterns in the flickering candlelight. Dotted here and there among the students, the ghosts shone misty silver. Mainly to avoid all the staring eyes, Heather looked upward and saw a velvety black ceiling dotted with stars. She heard Hermione whisper, "It's bewitched to look like the sky outside. I read about it in Hogwarts, A History."

It was hard to believe there was a ceiling there at all, and that the Great Hall didn't simply open on to the heavens. Heather quickly looked down again as Professor McGonagall silently placed a four-legged stool in front of the first years. On top of the stool she put a pointed wizard's hat. This hat was patched and frayed and extremely dirty. Noticing that everyone in the hall was now staring at the hat, she stared at it, too. For a few seconds, there was complete silence. Then the hat twitched. A rip near the brim opened wide like a mouth — and the hat began to sing:

_"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,_

_But don't judge on what you see,_

_I'll eat myself if you can find_

_A smarter hat than me._

_You can keep your bowlers black,_

_Your top hats sleek and tall,_

_For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat_

_And I can cap them all._

_There's nothing hidden in your head_

_The Sorting Hat can't see,_

_So try me on and I will tell you_

_Where you ought to be._

_You might belong in Gryffindor,_

_Where dwell the brave at heart,_

_Their daring, nerve, and chivalry_

_Set Gryffindors apart;_

_You might belong in Hufflepuff,_

_Where they are just and loyal,_

_Those patient Hufflepuffs are true_

_And unafraid of toil;_

_Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,_

_If you've a ready mind,_

_Where those of wit and learning,_

_Will always find their kind;_

_Or perhaps in Slytherin_

_You'll make your real friends,_

_Those cunning folk use any means_

_To achieve their ends._

_So put me on! Don't be afraid!_

_And don't get in a flap!_

_You're in safe hands (though I have none)_

_For I'm a Thinking Cap!"_

The whole hall burst into applause as the hat finished its song. It bowed to each of the four tables and then became quite still again.

"So we've just got to try on the hat!" Ron whispered to Heather. "I'll kill Fred; he was going on about wrestling a troll."

Heather smiled. Trying on a hat seemed a lot easier then wrestling a troll. Heather thought about which house she preferred, she admired all of the traits mentioned, loyalty cunning, wisdom and bravery. Professor McGonagall now stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment.

"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she said. "Abbott, Hannah!"

A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails stumbled out of line, put on the hat, which fell right down over her eyes, and sat down. A moments pause —"HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat.

The table on the right cheered and clapped as Hannah went to sit down at the Hufflepuff table. Heather saw the ghost of the Fat Friar waving merrily at her. "Bones, Susan!" "HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat again, and Susan scuttled off to sit next to Hannah.

"Boot, Terry!" "RAVENCLAW!" The table second from the left clapped this time; several Ravenclaws stood up to shake hands with Terry as he joined them.

"Brocklehurst, Mandy" went to Ravenclaw too, but "Brown, Lavender" became the first new Gryffindor, and the table on the far left exploded with cheers; Harry could see Ron's twin brothers catcalling.

"Bulstrode, Millicent" then became a Slytherin.

"Finch-Fletchley, Justin!" "HUFFLEPUFF!"

Sometimes, Heather noticed, the hat shouted out the house at once, but at others it took a little while to decide. "Finnigan, Seamus," the sandy-haired boy next to Heather in the line, sat on the stool for almost a whole minute before the hat declared him a Gryffindor.

"Granger, Hermione!"

Hermione almost ran to the stool and jammed the hat eagerly on her head.

"GRYFFINDOR!" shouted the hat. Ron groaned.

When Neville Longbottom the boy who kept losing his toad, was called, he fell over on his way to the stool.

The hat took a long time to decide with Neville. When it finally shouted, "GRYFFINDOR," Neville ran off still wearing it, and had to jog back amid gales of laughter to give it to "MacDougal, Morag."

Malfoy swaggered forward when his name was called and got his wish at once: the hat had barely touched his head when it screamed, "SLYTHERIN!"

Malfoy went to join his friends Crabbe and Goyle, looking pleased with himself. There weren't many people left now.

"Moon"… "Nott"… "Parkinson" then a pair of twin girls, "Patil" and "Patil"…, then "Perks, Sally-Anne"…, and then, at last — "Potter, Heather!"

As Heather stepped forward, whispers suddenly broke out like little hissing fires all over the hall.

"Potter, did she say?"

"The Heather Potter?"

"Look at her ears and tail!"

"What is she?"

'A girl you don't want to mess with.' was the last thought Heather had before the hat dropped over her eyes was the hall full of people craning to get a good look at her. Next second she was looking at the black inside of the hat. She waited.

"Hmm," said a small voice in her ear. "Difficult. Very difficult. Plenty of courage, I see. Not a bad mind either. There's talent, A my goodness, yes — and a nice thirst to prove yourself, now that's interesting… So where shall I put you?"

Heather silently thought of one of her most favorite traits.

"Bravery, eh?" said the small voice. "Are you sure? You could be great, you know, it's all here in your head, I think Slytherin will help you on the way to greatness, no doubt about that — no? Well, if you're sure — better be GRYFFINDOR!"

Heather heard the hat shout the last word to the whole hall. She took off the hat and walked calmly toward the Gryffindor table. She noticed that she was getting the loudest cheer yet.

Percy the Prefect got up and shook her hand vigorously, while the Weasley twins yelled, "We got Potter! We got Potter!" Heather sat down opposite the ghost in the ruff she'd seen earlier. The ghost patted her arm, giving Heather the sudden, horrible feeling she'd just plunged it into a bucket of ice-cold water.

She could see the High Table properly now. At the end nearest her sat Hagrid, who caught her eye and gave her the thumbs up. Heather grinned back. And there, in the center of the High Table, in a large gold chair, sat Albus Dumbledore. Heather recognized him at once from the card she'd gotten out of the Chocolate Frog on the train. Dumbledore's silver hair was the only thing in the whole hall that shone as brightly as the ghosts.

Heather spotted Professor Quirrell, too, the nervous young man from the Leaky Cauldron. He was looking very peculiar in a large purple turban. And now there were only three people left to be sorted. "Thomas, Dean," a Black boy even taller than Ron, joined Heather at the Gryffindor table.

"Turpin, Lisa," became a Ravenclaw and then it was Ron's turn. He was pale green by now. Heather hoped he would get what he wanted and a second later the hat had shouted, "GRYFFINDOR!"

Heather clapped loudly with the rest as Ron collapsed into the chair next to him. "Well done, Ron, excellent," said Percy Weasley pompously across Heather as "Zabini, Blaise," was made a Slytherin.

Professor McGonagall rolled up her scroll and took the Sorting Hat away. Heather looked down at her empty gold plate. She had only just realized how hungry she was. The pumpkin pasties seemed ages ago. She hoped she would be able to go hunting soon, even though she could go up to two weeks without food(It's a wolf thing) it didn't mean she wasn't hungry. Albus Dumbledore had gotten to his feet. He was beaming at the students, his arms opened wide, as if nothing could have pleased him more than to see them all there.

"Welcome," he said. "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

"Thank you!"

He sat back down. Everybody clapped and cheered. Heather looked up at Dumbledore with a questioning gaze. He simply nodded his head. Heather got up. Ron looked at her curiously.

"I'll tell you later." She said and jogged out of the great hall.

Hather quickly made her way outside and over to the forest. She saw Hagrid's hut, obviously where she was supposed to leave her leftovers. She shifted completely into her wolf form and ran into the forest.

She sniffed the air for any possible prey. She picked up the scent of several new creatures but she figured it would be best to stick with familiar prey. Following the scent of white tailed deer Heather made her way deeper into the forest. Soon the deer was in sight.

Heather quickly hid behind some undergrowth. She silently crept forwards, careful not to alert the deer. Soon she was practically right behind it. She bunched her muscles and pounced, landing right on the deer's back. It yelped in terror and tried to buck its attacker off. Heather held on tight and tried to steady herself so that she could place a well aimed bite.

Heather lunged forward and sank her teeth into the back of the deer's neck. She felt the blood gush into her mouth and drip down the sides of the deer's neck. Heather bit harder and heard it's neck snap. The deer froze and then collapsed. Panting, Heather stood up and observed her kill, this would definitely keep her fed for a few days. Heather grabbed the deer by one of it's legs and dragged it out of the forest to Hagrid's hut.

Once there she began to eat at the ribs, where most of the meat was. It was delicious, it tasted even better knowing that Heather caught it on her own. By the time she had eaten her fill she had eaten away at all of the ribs in the right side of the deer's body. Not knowing what to do when she was done Heather left the carcass there and ran back into the Great Hall, this time with no extra appendages.

She quickly sat back next to Ron. "What did I miss?" He quickly filled her in on everything she needed to know. Soon Heather started looking around.

She was starting to feel warm and sleepy, and looked up at the High Table again. Hagrid was drinking deeply from his goblet. Professor McGonagall was talking to Professor Dumbledore. Professor Quirrell, in his absurd turban, was talking to a teacher with greasy black hair, a hooked nose, and sallow skin. It happened very suddenly. The hook-nosed teacher looked past Quirrell's turban straight into Harry's eyes — and a sharp, hot pain shot across the scar on Heather's forehead.

Heather hissed and clapped a hand to her head.

"What is it?" asked Percy.

"N-nothing."

The pain had gone as quickly as it had come. Harder to shake off was the feeling Heather had gotten from the teacher's look — a feeling that he didn't like Heather at all.

"Who's that teacher talking to Professor Quirrell?" She asked Percy.

"Oh, you know Quirrell already, do you? No wonder he's looking so nervous, that's Professor Snape. He teaches Potions, but he doesn't want to — everyone knows he's after Quirrell's job. Knows an awful lot about the Dark Arts, Snape."

Heather watched Snape for a while, but Snape didn't look at her again.

At last, the desserts too disappeared, and Professor Dumbledore got to his feet again. The hall fell silent.

"Ahem — just a few more words now that we are all fed and watered. I have a few start-of-term notices to give you. First years should note that the forest on the grounds is forbidden to all pupils. And a few of our older students would do well to remember that as well."

Dumbledore's twinkling eyes flashed in the direction of the Weasley twins.

"I have also been asked by Mr. Filch, the caretaker, to remind you all that no magic should be used between classes in the corridors. Quidditch trials will be held in the second week of the term. Anyone interested in playing for their house teams should contact Madam Hooch and finally, I must tell you that this year; the third-floor corridor on the right-hand side is out of bounds to everyone who does not wish to die a very painful death."

Heather laughed, but she was one of the few who did.

"He's not serious?" he muttered to Percy.

"Must be," said Percy, frowning at Dumbledore. "It's odd, because he usually gives us a reason why we're not allowed to go somewhere — the forest's full of dangerous beasts, everyone knows that. I do think he might have told us prefects, at least."

"And now, before we go to bed, let us sing the school song!" cried Dumbledore. Heather noticed that the other teachers' smiles had become rather fixed.

Dumbledore gave his wand a little flick, as if he was trying to get a fly off the end, and a long golden ribbon flew out of it, which rose high above the tables and twisted itself, snakelike, into words.

"Everyone pick their favorite tune," said Dumbledore, "and off we go!"

And the school bellowed:

_"Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,_

_Teach us something please,_

_Whether we be old and bald_

_Or young with scabby knees,_

_Our heads could do with filling_

_With some interesting stuff,_

_For now they're bare and full of air,_

_Dead flies and bits of fluff,_

_So teach us things worth knowing,_

_Bring back what we've forgot,_

_Just do your best, we'll do the rest,_

_And learn until our brains all rot."_

Everybody finished the song at different times. At last, only the Weasley twins were left singing along to a very slow funeral march. Dumbledore conducted their last few lines with his wand and when they had finished, he was one of those who clapped loudest.

"Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes. "A magic beyond all we do here! And now, bedtime. Off you trot!"

The Gryffindor first years followed Percy through the chattering crowds, out of the Great Hall, and up the marble staircase. Heather's legs were like lead, but only because she was so tired and full of food. She was too sleepy even to be surprised that the people in the portraits along the corridors whispered and pointed as they passed, or that twice Percy led them through doorways hidden behind sliding panels and hanging tapestries. They climbed more staircases, yawning and dragging their feet, and Heather was just wondering how much farther they had to go when they came to a sudden halt.

A bundle of walking sticks was floating in midair ahead of them, and as Percy took a step toward them they started throwing themselves at him.

"Peeves," Percy whispered to the first years. "A poltergeist." He raised his voice, "Peeves — show yourself."

A loud, rude sound, like the air being let out of a balloon, answered.

"Do you want me to go to the Bloody Baron?"

There was a pop, and a little man with wicked, dark eyes and a wide mouth appeared, floating cross-legged in the air, clutching the walking sticks.

"Oooooooh!" he said, with an evil cackle. "Ickle Firsties! What fun!"

He swooped suddenly at them. They all ducked.

"Go away, Peeves, or the Baron'll hear about this, I mean it!" barked Percy.

Peeves stuck out his tongue and vanished, dropping the walking sticks on Neville's head.

They heard him zooming away, rattling coats of armor as he passed.

"You want to watch out for Peeves," said Percy, as they set off again. "The Bloody Baron's the only one who can control him, he won't even listen to us prefects. Here we are."

At the very end of the corridor hung a portrait of a very fat woman in a pink silk dress.

"Password?" she said.

"Caput Draconis," said Percy, and the portrait swung forward to reveal a round hole in the wall. They all scrambled through it — Neville needed a leg up — and found themselves in the Gryffindor common room, a cozy, round room full of squashy armchairs.

Percy directed the girls through one door to their dormitory and the boys through another.

At the top of a spiral staircase — they were obviously in one of the towers — they found their beds at last: five four-posters hung with deep red, velvet curtains. Their trunks had already been brought up. Too tired to talk much, they pulled on their pajamas and fell into bed.

"Great food, isn't it?" The girl named Lavender muttered to Harry through the hangings.

Heather was about to answer but she was so tired that the moment her head hit the pillow she fell asleep almost at once.

Perhaps Heather had eaten a bit too much, because she had a very strange dream. She was wearing Professor Quirrell's turban, which kept talking to her, telling her she must transfer to Slytherin at once, because it was her destiny. Heather told the turban he didn't want to be in Slytherin; it got heavier and heavier; she tried to pull it off but it tightened painfully — and there was Malfoy, laughing at him as he struggled with it — then Malfoy turned into the hook-nosed teacher, Snape, whose laugh became high and cold — there was a burst of green light and Heather woke with a very confused look on her face. Weird, she shrugged her shoulders, she rolled over and fell asleep again, and when she woke next day, she didn't remember the dream at all.

**ATTENTION, I HAVE CHANGED MY MIND ABOUT THE VEELA THING. HEATHER IS ALREADY ANMALISTIC ENOUGH, NO NEED TO ADD FEATHERS AND TALONS.**

**THANK YOU TO ALL THOSE WHO READ AND REVIEW I LOVE YOU, BY THE WAY, I NEED SOME MALE OC SUBMISSIONS, I'VE ONLY HAD FEMALE SO FAR.**

**LOVE YOU GUYS!**


	6. The Potions Master

"There, look."

"Where?"

"Next to the tall kid with the red hair."

"With the curly red hair?"

"Did you see her face?"

"Did you see her scar?"

"See her ears and tail?"

Whispers followed Heather from the moment she left her dormitory the next day. People lining up outside classrooms stood on tiptoe to get a look at her, or doubled back to pass her in the corridors again, staring. Heather wished they wouldn't, because she was trying to concentrate on finding her way to classes and it was getting really annoying. She didn't wear her appendages in class, just during meal times, passing time and while in the common room.

There were a hundred and forty-two staircases at Hogwarts: wide, sweeping ones; narrow, rickety ones; some that led somewhere different on a Friday; some with a vanishing step halfway up that you had to remember to jump. Then there were doors that wouldn't open unless you asked politely, or tickled them in exactly the right place, and doors that weren't really doors at all, but solid walls just pretending. It was also very hard to remember where anything was, because it all seemed to move around a lot.

The people in the portraits kept going to visit each other, and Heather was sure the coats of armour could walk. The ghosts didn't help, either. It was always a nasty shock when one of them glided suddenly through a door you were trying to open. Nearly Headless Nick was always happy to point new Gryffindors in the right direction, but Peeves the Poltergeist was worth two locked doors and a trick staircase if you met him when you were late for class.

He would drop wastepaper baskets on your head, pull rugs from under your feet, pelt you with bits of chalk, or sneak up behind you, invisible, grab your nose, and screech, "GOT YOUR CONK!"

Even worse than Peeves, if that was possible, was the caretaker, Argus Filch. Heather and Ron managed to get on the wrong side of him on their very first morning. Filch found them trying to force their way through a door that unluckily turned out to be the entrance to the out-of-bounds corridor on the third floor.

He wouldn't believe they were lost, was sure they were trying to break into it on purpose, and was threatening to lock them in the dungeons when they were rescued by Professor Quirrell, who was passing.

Filch owned a cat called Mrs. Norris, a scrawny, dust-coloured creature with bulging, lamp like eyes just like Filch's. She patrolled the corridors alone. Break a rule in front of her, put just one toe out of line, and she'd whisk off for Filch, who'd appear, wheezing, two seconds later. Filch knew the secret passageways of the school better than anyone (except perhaps the Weasley twins) and could pop up as suddenly as any of the ghosts. The students all hated him, and it was the dearest ambition of many to give Mrs. Norris a good kick.

And then, once you had managed to find them, there were the classes themselves. There was a lot more to magic, as Heather quickly found out, than waving your wand and saying a few funny words. During the first few weeks she would read her text books before class to brush up on information.

They had to study the night skies through their telescopes every Wednesday at midnight and learn the names of different stars and the movements of the planets. Three times a week they went out to the greenhouses behind the castle to study Herbology, with a dumpy little witch called Professor Sprout, where they learned how to take care of all the strange plants and fungi, and found out what they were used for. Easily the most boring class was History of Magic, which was the only one taught by a ghost. Professor Binns had been very old indeed when he had fallen asleep in front of the staff room fire and got up next morning to teach, leaving his body behind him. Binns droned on and on while they scribbled down names and dates, and got Emetic the Evil and Uric the Oddball mixed up.

Professor Flitwick, the Charms teacher, was a tiny little wizard who had to stand on a pile of books to see over his desk. At the start of their first class he took the roll call, and when he reached Heather's name he gave an excited squeak and toppled out of sight.

Professor McGonagall was again different. Heather had been quite right to think she wasn't a teacher to cross. Strict and clever, she gave them a talking-to the moment they sat down in her first class.

"Transfiguration is some of the most complex and dangerous magic you will learn at Hogwarts," she said. "Anyone messing around in my class will leave and not come back. You have been warned."

Then she changed her desk into a pig and back again. They were all very impressed and couldn't wait to get started, but soon realized they weren't going to be changing the furniture into animals for a long time. After taking a lot of complicated notes, they were each given a match and started trying to turn it into a needle. By the end of the lesson, only Hermione Granger had made any difference to her match; Professor McGonagall showed the class how it had gone all silver and pointy and gave Hermione a rare smile.

The class everyone had really been looking forward to was Defence Against the Dark Arts, but Quirrell's lessons turned out to be a bit of a joke. His classroom smelled strongly of garlic, which everyone said was to ward off a vampire he'd met in Romania and was afraid would be coming back to get him one of these days. His turban, he told them, had been given to him by an African prince as a thank-you for getting rid of a troublesome zombie, but they weren't sure they believed this story.

For one thing, when Seamus Finnigan asked eagerly to hear how Quirrell had fought off the zombie, Quirrell went pink and started talking about the weather; for another, they had noticed that a funny smell hung around the turban, and the Weasley twins insisted that it was stuffed full of garlic as well, so that Quirrell was protected wherever he went.

Heather noticed quickly that no one really had a head start or was behind. There were plenty of people in her classes who didn't know they were a witch or a wizard until they got their letters, even people from Pureblood families like Ron didn't have much of a head start.

Friday was an important day for Heather and Ron.

They finally managed to find their way down to the Great Hall for breakfast without getting lost once.

"What have we got today?" Heather asked Ron as she poured sugar on her porridge. Heather was only allowed to hunt for dinner, she had to eat in the great hall during breakfast and lunch.

"Double Potions with the Slytherins," said Ron. "Snape's Head of Slytherin House. They say he always favours them — we'll be able to see if it's true."

"Wish McGonagall favoured us," said Heather. Professor McGonagall was head of Gryffindor House, but it hadn't stopped her from giving them a huge pile of homework the day before.

Just then, the mail arrived. Heather had gotten used to this by now, but it had given her a bit of a shock on the first morning, when about a hundred owls had suddenly streamed into the Great Hall during breakfast, circling the tables until they saw their owners, and dropping letters and packages onto their laps.

Cheza hadn't brought Heather anything so far. She sometimes flew in to nibble her ear, which she grew to wolf size, people were still staring at them, and have a bit of toast before going off to sleep in the owlery with the other school owls.

This morning, however, she fluttered down between the marmalade and the sugar bowl and dropped a note onto Heather's plate. Heather tore it open at once. It said, in a very untidy scrawl:

_Dear Heather,_

_I know you get Friday afternoons off, so would you like to come and have a cup of tea with me around three?_

_I want to hear all about your first week. Send us an answer back with Hedwig._

_Hagrid_

Heather borrowed Ron's quill, scribbled _Yes, please, see you later _on the back of the note, and sent Hedwig off again.

It was lucky that Heather had tea with Hagrid to look forward to, because the Potions lesson turned out to be the worst thing that had happened to her so far.

At the start-of-term banquet, Heather had gotten the idea that Professor Snape disliked her. By the end of the first Potions lesson, she knew she'd been wrong.

Snape didn't dislike Heather.

he _hated _her.

Potions lessons took place down in one of the dungeons. It was colder here than up in the main castle, and would have been quite creepy enough without the pickled animals floating in glass jars all around the walls. Snape, like Flitwick, started the class by taking the roll call, and like Flitwick, he paused at Heather's name.

"Ah, Yes," he said softly, "Heather Potter. Our new — _celebrity_."

Draco Malfoy and his friends Crabbe and Goyle sniggered behind their hands. Snape finished calling the names and looked up at the class. His eyes were black like Hagrid's, but they had none of Hagrid's warmth. They were cold and empty and made you think of dark tunnels.

"You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion making," he began. He spoke in barely more than a whisper, but they caught every word — like Professor McGonagall, Snape had the gift of keeping a class silent without effort. "As there is little foolish wand-waving here, many of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don't expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses…I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death — if you aren't as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach." .

More silence followed this little speech. Heather and Ron exchanged looks with raised eyebrows. Hermione Granger was on the edge of her seat and looked desperate to start proving that she wasn't a dunderhead.

"Potter!" said Snape suddenly. "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

'Powdered root of asphodel to infusion of wormwood.' Heather rolled this question over in her head, she had read this before class. Hermione's hand had shot into the air.

"Draught of Living Death," said Heather.

Snape's lips curled into a sneer.

He ignored Hermione's hand.

"Let's try again. Potter, where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?"

Hermione stretched her hand as high into the air as it would go without her leaving her seat, but Heather remembered what bezoar was. She tried not to look at Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle, who were shaking with laughter.

"Stomach of a goat sir." 'Yummy goat.' Heather thought to herself.

"Thought you should open a book before coming, eh, Potter?" Heather forced kept looking straight into those cold eyes. She was now incredibly glad that she looked over the book before class started.

Snape was still ignoring Hermione's quivering hand.

"What is the difference, Potter, between Monkshood and Wolfsbane?"

At this, Hermione stood up, her hand stretching toward the dungeon ceiling.

"They're the same thing," said Heather confidently.

"Do you know the other name for Monkshood and Wolfsbane?" Snape asked.

"Yea-No." Heather shook her head, she didn't know everything.

"Sit down," he snapped at Hermione. "For your information, Potter, monkshood and Wolfsbane also go by the name of aconite. Well? Why aren't you all copying that down?"

There was a sudden rummaging for quills and parchment. Things went downhill swiftly for the Gryffindors as the Potions lesson continued. Snape put them all into pairs and set them to mixing up a simple potion to cure boils. He swept around in his long black cloak, watching them weigh dried nettles and crush snake fangs, criticizing almost everyone except Malfoy, whom he seemed to like. He was just telling everyone to look at the perfect way Malfoy had stewed his horned slugs when clouds of acid green smoke and a loud hissing filled the dungeon.

Neville had somehow managed to melt Seamus' cauldron into a twisted blob, and their potion was seeping across the stone floor, burning holes in people's shoes. Within seconds, the whole class was standing on their stools while Neville, who had been drenched in the potion when the cauldron collapsed, moaned in pain as angry red boils sprang up all over his arms and legs.

"Idiot boy!" snarled Snape, clearing the spilled potion away with one wave of his wand. "I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking the cauldron off the fire?"

Neville whimpered as boils started to pop up all over his nose.

"Take him up to the hospital wing," Snape spat at Seamus. Then he rounded on Heather and Ron, who had been working next to Neville.

"You — Potter — why didn't you tell him not to add the quills? Thought he'd make you look good if he got it wrong, did you? That's a point you've lost for Gryffindor."

This was so unfair that Heather opened her mouth to argue, but Ron kicked her behind their cauldron. She turned towards him and snarled with her fangs barred.

"Don't push it," he muttered, now used to Heather's wolf ways. She had told him all about her life as a wolf and what happened to her, minus the whole Darcia craziness. He seemed appalled that her supposed guardians abandoned her but he was very interested in her life in the forest. "I've heard Snape can turn very nasty."

As they climbed the steps out of the dungeon an hour later, Heather's mind was racing. She'd lost a point for Gryffindor in his very first week for doing exactly what she should—_why _did Snape hate her so much?

"Cheer up," said Ron, "Snape's always taking points off Fred and George. Can I come and meet Hagrid with you?"

At five to three they left the castle and made their way across the grounds. Hagrid lived in a small wooden house on the edge of the forbidden forest. A crossbow and a pair of galoshes were outside the front door, including her mostly finished deer carcass, hanging upside down. Heather had almost eaten all the flesh from the bones but there was still enough for dinner tonight.

When Heather knocked they heard a frantic scrabbling from inside and several booming barks. Then Hagrid's voice rang out, saying, "_Back_, Fang —_back_."

Hagrid's big, hairy face appeared in the crack as he pulled the door open.

"Hang on," he said. "_Back_, Fang."

He let them in, struggling to keep a hold on the collar of an enormous black boarhound. There was only one room inside. Hams and pheasants were hanging from the ceiling, a copper kettle was boiling on the open fire, and in the corner stood a massive bed with a patchwork quilt over it.

"Make yerselves at home," said Hagrid, letting go of Fang, who bounded straight at Ron and started licking his ears. Like Hagrid, Fang was clearly not as fierce as he looked.

"This is Ron," Heather told Hagrid, who was pouring boiling water into a large teapot and putting rock cakes onto a plate.

"Another Weasley, eh?" said Hagrid, glancing at Ron's freckles.

"I spent half me life chasin' yer twin brothers away from the forest."

The rock cakes were shapeless lumps with raisins that almost broke their teeth, but Heather enjoyed it and Ron pretended to be enjoying it as they both told Hagrid all about their first lessons. Fang rested his head at Heather's feet. He must have known that she was a wolf because he didn't jump all over her.

Heather and Ron were delighted to hear Hagrid call Filch "that old git."

"An' as fer that cat, Mrs. Norris, I'd like ter introduce hero Fang sometime.

D'yeh know, every time I go up ter the school, she follows me everywhere? Can't get rid of her — Filch puts her up to it."

Heather told Hagrid about Snape's lesson. Hagrid, like Ron, told Heather not to worry about it, that Snape liked hardly any of the students.

"But he seemed to really _hate _me."

"Rubbish!" said Hagrid. "Why should he?"

Yet Heather couldn't help thinking that Hagrid didn't quite meet her eyes when he said that.

"How's yer brother Charlie?" Hagrid asked Ron. "I liked him a lot — great with animals."

Heather wondered if Hagrid had changed the subject on purpose. While Ron told Hagrid all about Charlie's work with dragons, Heather picked up a piece of paper that was lying on the table under the tea cozy. It was a cutting from the _Daily Prophet_:

_GRINGOTTS BREAK-IN LATEST_

_Investigations continue into the break-in at Gringotts on 31 July, widely believed to be the work of Dark wizards or witches unknown. Gringotts goblins today insisted that nothing had been taken. The vault that was searched had in fact been emptied the same day._

"_But we're not telling you what was in there, so keep your noses out if you know what's good for you," said a Gringotts spokes goblin this afternoon._

Heather remembered Ron telling her on the train that someone had tried to rob Gringotts, but Ron hadn't mentioned the date.

"Hagrid!" said Heather, "that Gringotts break-in happened on my birthday! It might've been happening while we were there!"

There was no doubt about it, Hagrid definitely didn't meet Heather's eyes this time. He grunted and offered her another rock cake. Harry read the story again. _The vault that was searched had in fact been emptied earlier that same day._Hagrid had emptied vault seven hundred and thirteen, if you could call it emptying, taking out that grubby little package.

Had that been what the thieves were looking for?

As Ron walked back to the castle for dinner, his pockets weighed down with rock cakes he'd been too polite to refuse, Heather thought that none of the lessons she'd had so far had given her as much to think about as tea with Hagrid.

Had Hagrid collected that package just in time? Where was it now? And did Hagrid know something about Snape that he didn't want to tell Heather? She tried to push those thoughts out of her head as she finished cleaning the meat from the bones. She would have to go hunting tomorrow.

**I am just writing these s chapters rapid fire aren't I? Now to answer some questions about how Heather got the questions right, Heather is not Harry, she is different, she thinks different and acts different. Read and Review. Leopardfang of Moonclan out!**


	7. The Midnight Duel

**I own nothing except my oc's! Please keep reviewing.**

Heather had been right when she believed she would never meet a person she hated more than Darcia, but Draco Malfoy was a close second. Still, first-year Gryffindors only had Potions with the Slytherins, so they didn't have to put up with Malfoy much.

Or at least, they didn't until they spotted a notice pinned up in the Gryffindor common room that made them all groan. Flying lessons would be starting on Thursday — and Gryffindor and Slytherin would be learning together.

"Cool," said Heather. "I've been curious about flying ever since I heard about Qudditch." She had been looking forward to learning to fly more than anything else.

"You'll love it," said Ron enthusiastically. "Anyway, I know Malfoy's always going on about how good he is at Quidditch, but I bet that's all talk."

Malfoy certainly did talk about flying a lot. He complained loudly about first years never getting on the house Quidditch teams and told long, boastful stories that always seemed to end with him narrowly escaping Muggles in helicopters. The last one was definitely the most outrageous, too bad though, if it was true and it was a military helicopter they could have shot him down.

He wasn't the only one, though: the way Seamus Finnigan told it, he'd spent most of his childhood zooming around the countryside on his broomstick. Even Ron would tell anyone who'd listen about the time he'd almost hit a hang glider on Charlie's old broom. Everyone from wizarding families talked about Quidditch constantly.

Ron had already had a big argument with Dean Thomas, who shared their dormitory, about soccer. Ron couldn't see what was exciting about a game with only one ball where no one was allowed to fly. Heather had caught Ron prodding Dean's poster of West Ham soccer team, trying to make the players move.

Neville had never been on a broomstick in his life, because his grandmother had never let him near one. Privately, Heather felt she'd had good reason, because Neville managed to have an extraordinary number of accidents even with both feet on the ground.

Hermione Granger was almost as nervous about flying as Neville was. This was something you couldn't learn by heart out of a book — not that she hadn't tried. At breakfast on Thursday she bored them all stupid with flying tips she'd gotten out of a library book called Quidditch Through the Ages.

Neville was hanging on to her every word, desperate for anything that might help him hang on to his broomstick later, but everybody else was very pleased when Hermione's lecture was interrupted by the arrival of the mail.

Heather hadn't had a single letter since Hagrid's note, something that Malfoy had been quick to notice, of course. Malfoy's eagle owl was always bringing him packages of sweets from home, which he opened gloatingly at the Slytherin table.

Cheza flew down with a letter in her beak. She landed gracefully on the table. Heather took the letter from her beak and gave her some of her toast. Heather had written a letter to them yesterday, this was the reply.

_Dear Heather,_

_We're all doing fine. The prey is running well for us and apparently you as well. The castle sounds amazing. Tsume says he wants to go hunting with you, to see if you really do have the skill to take down a full grown deer by yourself or if you're just bluffing. Don't let that Professor Snape or Malfoy kid get to you. Keep your head up, ears forward and tail high._

_With Lots of Love,_

_Kiba_

_Tsume_

_Hige_

_Blue_

_Toboe_

_Blaze _

_And Mary_

There were two pictures in the envelope. One of the pack in front of the mansion in human form and one in wolf. They were all smiling and waving. It wasn't a magic picture so they weren't moving.

While Heather was showing Ron each of her pack mates a barn owl brought Neville a small package from his grandmother. He opened it excitedly and showed them a glass ball the size of a large marble, which seemed to be full of white smoke.

"It's a Remembrall!" he explained. "Gran knows I forget things — this tells you if there's something you've forgotten to do. Look, you hold it tight like this and if it turns red — oh…" His face fell, because the Remembrall had suddenly glowed scarlet, "… you've forgotten something…"

Neville was trying to remember what he'd forgotten when Draco Malfoy, who was passing the Gryffindor table, snatched the Remembrall out of his hand. Heather and Ron jumped to their feet. They were half hoping for a reason to fight Malfoy, but Professor McGonagall, who could spot trouble quicker than any teacher in the school, was there in a flash.

"What's going on?"

"Malfoy's got my Remembrall, Professor."

Scowling, Malfoy quickly dropped the Remembrall back on the table.

"Just looking," he said, and he sloped away with Crabbe and Goyle behind him.

At three-thirty that afternoon, Heather, Ron, and the other Gryffindors hurried down the front steps onto the grounds for their first flying lesson. It was a clear, breezy day, and the grass rippled under their feet as they marched down the sloping lawns toward a smooth, flat lawn on the opposite side of the grounds to the forbidden forest, whose trees were swaying darkly in the distance.

The Slytherins were already there, and so were twenty broomsticks lying in neat lines on the ground. Heather had heard Fred and George Weasley complain about the school brooms, saying that some of them started to vibrate if you flew too high, or always flew slightly to the left. Their teacher, Madam Hooch, arrived. She had short, gray hair, and yellow eyes like a hawk.

"Well, what are you all waiting for?" she barked. "Everyone stand by a broomstick. Come on, hurry up." Heather glanced down at her broom. It was old and some of the twigs stuck out at odd angles.

"Stick out your right hand over your broom," called Madam Hooch at the front, "and say 'Up!'"

"UP" everyone shouted.

Heather's broom jumped into her hand at once, but it was one of the few that did. Hermione Granger's had simply rolled over on the ground, and Neville's hadn't moved at all. Perhaps brooms, like horses, could tell when you were afraid, thought Heather; there was a quaver in Neville's voice that said only too clearly that he wanted to keep his feet on the ground.

Madam Hooch then showed them how to mount their brooms without sliding off the end, and walked up and down the rows correcting their grips. Heather and Ron were delighted when she told Malfoy he'd been doing it wrong for years.

"Now, when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground, hard," said Madam Hooch. "Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet, and then come straight back down by leaning forward slightly. On my whistle — three — two —"

But Neville, nervous and jumpy and frightened of being left on the ground, pushed off hard before the whistle had touched Madam Hooch's lips.

"Come back, boy!" she shouted, but Heather watched as Neville was rising straight up like a cork shot out of a bottle — twelve feet — twenty feet. Heather saw his scared white face look down at the ground falling away, saw him gasp, slip sideways off the broom and —

WHAM — a thud and a nasty crack and Neville lay face down on the grass in a heap. His broomstick was still rising higher and higher, and started to drift lazily toward the forbidden forest and out of sight. Madam Hooch was bending over Neville, her face as white as his.

"Broken wrist," Heather heard her mutter. Heather winced sympathetically, she handy broken her wrist before but she had gotten broken bones and was once kicked in the head by a caribou. "Come on, boy — it's all right, up you get."

She turned to the rest of the class.

"None of you is to move while I take this boy to the hospital wing! You leave those brooms where they are or you'll be out of Hogwarts before you can say 'Quidditch.' Come on, dear."

Neville, his face tear-streaked, clutching his wrist, hobbled off with Madam Hooch, who had her arm around him. No sooner were they out of earshot than Malfoy burst into laughter.

"Did you see his face, the great lump?"

The other Slytherins joined in.

"Shut up, Malfoy," snapped Parvati Patil.

"Ooh, sticking up for Longbottom?" said Pansy Parkinson, a hard-faced Slytherin girl. "Never thought you'd like fat little crybabies, Parvati."

"Look!" said Malfoy, darting forward and snatching something out of the grass. "It's that stupid thing Longbottom's gran sent him."

The Remembrall glittered in the sun as he held it up.

"Give that here, Malfoy," said Heather as she walked forward. Everyone stopped talking to watch.

Malfoy smiled nastily.

"I think I'll leave it somewhere for Longbottom to find — how about — up a tree?"

"Give it here!" Heather yelled, but Malfoy had leapt onto his broomstick and taken off. He hadn't been lying, he could fly well.

Hovering level with the topmost branches of an oak he called, "Come and get it, Potter!"

Heather grabbed her broom.

"No!" shouted Hermione Granger. "Madam Hooch told us not to move — you'll get us all into trouble."

Heather ignored her. Blood was pounding in her ears. She mounted the broom and kicked hard against the ground and up, up she soared; air rushed through her hair, and her robes whipped out behind her— and in a rush of fierce joy she realized she'd found something she could do without being taught — this was easy, this was wonderful.

She pulled her broomstick up a little to take it even higher and heard screams and gasps of girls back on the ground and an admiring whoop from Ron. She turned her broomstick sharply to face Malfoy in midair. Malfoy looked stunned.

"Give it here," Heather called, "or I'll knock you off that broom!"

"Oh, yeah?" said Malfoy, trying to sneer, but looking worried.

Heather knew, somehow, what to do. She leaned forward and grasped the broom tightly in both hands, and it shot toward Malfoy like a javelin. Malfoy only just got out of the way in time; Heather made a sharp about-face and held the broom steady. A few people below were clapping.

"No Crabbe and Goyle up here to save your neck, Malfoy," Heather called. "Not that they'd be of much help. Remember the train?" Heather flashed her fangs again and snarled loudly.

The same thought seemed to have struck Malfoy.

"Catch it if you can, then!" he shouted. "Ready girl?" He asked, waving the Remembrall like he would a squeaky toy in front of a Chihuahua. Heather's wolf ears sprang out and she growled some more. "FETCH!" and he threw the glass ball high into the air and streaked back toward the ground.

Heather saw, as though in slow motion, the ball rise up in the air and then start to fall. She leaned forward and pointed her broom handle down — next second she was gathering speed in a steep dive, racing the ball — wind whistled in her ears, mingled with the screams of people watching — she stretched out her hand — a foot from the ground she caught it, just in time to pull her broom straight, and she landed gently onto the grass with the Remembrall clutched safely in her fist.

"HEATHER POTTER!"

Professor McGonagall was running toward them.

"Never — in all my time at Hogwarts —"

Professor McGonagall was almost speechless with shock, and her glasses flashed furiously, "— how dare you — might have broken your neck —"

"It wasn't her fault, Professor —"

"Be quiet, Miss Patil —"

"But Malfoy —"

"That's enough, Mr. Weasley. Potter, follow me, now."

Heather caught sight of Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle's triumphant faces as she left, walking numbly in Professor McGonagall's wake as she strode toward the castle. She was in trouble that much was obvious. Heather pocketed the Remembrall; she would give it back to Neville later.

She wanted to say something to defend herself, but she was more focused on following the Transfiguration professor. Professor McGonagall was sweeping along without even looking at her; she had to jog to keep up.

Up the front steps, up the marble staircase inside and still Professor McGonagall didn't say a word to her. She wrenched open doors and marched along corridors with Heather trotting behind her. Professor McGonagall stopped outside a classroom. She opened the door and poked her head inside.

"Excuse me, Professor Flitwick, could I borrow Wood for a moment?"

'Wood?' thought Heather, bewildered; 'who was Wood?'

But Wood was a burly fifth-year boy who came out of Flitwick's class looking confused.

"Follow me, you two," said Professor McGonagall, and they marched on up the corridor, Wood looking curiously at Heather, especially at her ears.

"In here."

Professor McGonagall pointed them into a classroom that was empty except for Peeves, who was busy writing rude words on the blackboard.

"Out, Peeves!" she barked. Peeves threw the chalk into a bin, which clanged loudly, and he swooped out cursing. Professor McGonagall slammed the door behind him and turned to face the two boys.

"Potter, this is Oliver Wood. Wood — I've found you a Seeker."

Wood's expression changed from puzzlement to delight.

"Are you serious, Professor?"

"Absolutely," said Professor McGonagall crisply. "The girl's a natural. I've never seen anything like it. Was that your first time on a broomstick, Potter?"

Heather nodded silently. She didn't have a clue what was going on, but she didn't seem to be in trouble.

"She caught that thing in her hand after a fifty-foot dive," Professor McGonagall told Wood. "Didn't even scratch herself. Charlie Weasley couldn't have done it."

Wood was now looking as though all his dreams had come true at once.

"Ever seen a game of Quidditch, Potter?" he asked excitedly.

"Wood's captain of the Gryffindor team," Professor McGonagall explained.

"She's just the build for a Seeker, too," said Wood, now walking around Heather and staring at her. "Light —speedy — we'll have to get her a decent broom, Professor — a Nimbus Two Thousand or a Cleansweep Seven, I'd say."

"I shall speak to Professor Dumbledore and see if we can't bend the first-year rule. Heaven knows, we need a better team than last year. Flattened in that last match by Slytherin, I couldn't look Severus Snape in the face for weeks…" Professor McGonagall peered sternly over her glasses at Heather.

"I want to hear you're training hard, Potter, or I may change my mind about punishing you."

Then she suddenly smiled.

"Your father would have been proud," she said. "He was an excellent Quidditch player himself."

Heather smiled, and then remembered what was in her pocket. She pulled out the Remembrall, which was fading back to clear. "Can I take this back to Neville? He's in the hospital wing." Heather said.

"Of course." McGonagall said. Heather shifted into her wolf form, the Remembrall clasped gently in her jaws as she ran towards the hospital wing.

It wasn't that difficult to find and she didn't see anyone on her way there. She pushed open the large doors and saw Neville sitting on a hospital bed. Neville looked over, saw the wolf and let out a small terrified squeak. Heather wagged her tail in an attempt to seem less frightening, it worked a little bit. She quickly trotted over, placed the Remembrall by Neville's hand, to which he muttered a "thank you" and then left the hospital wing before Madam Pomfrey came by.

"You're joking."

It was dinnertime. Heather had just finished telling Ron what had happened when he'd left the grounds with Professor McGonagall. She had already had dinner; it was a much easier kill this time. She had caught an old elk this time. Ron had a piece of steak and kidney pie halfway to his mouth, but he'd forgotten all about it.

"Seeker?" he said. "But first years never — you must be the youngest house player in about —"

"— A century," said Heather, nibbling on a cookie. She definitely had a sweet tooth, or fang, either way. It didn't matter how full she was if there were sweets in front of her she had to have at least on, no matter how sick it made her. "Wood told me."

Ron was so amazed, so impressed; he just sat and gaped at Heather.

"I start training next week," said Heather. "Only don't tell anyone, Wood wants to keep it a secret."

Fred and George Weasley now came into the hall, spotted Heather, and hurried over.

"Well done," said George in a low voice. "Wood told us. We're on the team too — Beaters."

"I tell you, we're going to win that Quidditch cup for sure this year," said Fred. "We haven't won since Charlie left, but this year's team is going to be brilliant. You must be good, Heather, Wood was almost skipping when he told us."

"Anyway, we've got to go; Lee Jordan reckons he's found a new secret passageway out of the school."

"Bet it's that one behind the statue of Gregory the Smarmy that we found in our first week. See you."

Fred and George had hardly disappeared when someone far less welcome turned up: Malfoy, flanked by Crabbe and Goyle.

"Having a last meal, Potter? When are you getting the train back to your fellow mutts?"

"You're a lot braver now that you're back on the ground and you've got your little friends with you," said Heather coolly. There was of course nothing at all little about Crabbe and Goyle, but as the High Table was full of teachers, neither of them could do more than crack their knuckles and scowl. "Then again, they never really do help."

"I'd take you on anytime on my own," said Malfoy. "Tonight, if you want. Wizard's duel. Wands only — no contact. What's the matter? Never heard of a wizard's duel before, I suppose?"

"Of course she has," said Ron, wheeling around. "I'm her second, who's yours?"

Malfoy looked at Crabbe and Goyle, sizing them up.

"Crabbe," he said. "Midnight all right? We'll meet you in the trophy room; that's always unlocked."

When Malfoy had gone, Ron and Heather looked at each other.

"What is a wizard's duel?" said Heather. "And what do you mean, you're my second?"

"Well, a second's there to take over if you die," said Ron casually, getting started at last on his cold pie. "But people only die in proper duels, you know, with real wizards. The most you and Malfoy'll be able to do is send sparks at each other. Neither of you knows enough magic to do any real damage. I bet he expected you to refuse, anyway."

"And what if I wave my wand and nothing happens?"

"Throw it away and punch him on the nose, or give him a good bite." Ron suggested.

"Excuse me."

They both looked up. It was Hermione Granger.

"Can't a person eat in peace in this place?" said Ron.

Hermione ignored him and spoke to Heather.

"I couldn't help overhearing what you and Malfoy were saying —"

"Bet you could," Ron muttered.

"— and you mustn't go wandering around the school at night, think of the points you'll lose Gryffindor if you're caught, and you're bound to be. It's really very selfish of you."

"And it's really none of your business," said Heather.

"Good-bye," said Ron.

All the same, it wasn't what you'd call the perfect end to the day, Heather thought, as she lay awake much later listening to Lavender and Pavarti falling asleep. Ron had spent all evening giving her advice such as "If he tries to curse you, you'd better dodge it, because I can't remember how to block them."

There was a very good chance they were going to get caught by Filch or Mrs. Norris, and Heather felt she was pushing her luck, breaking another school rule today. On the other hand, Malfoy's sneering face kept looming up out of the darkness — this was her big chance to beat Malfoy face-to-face, again. She couldn't miss it.

At half past eleven Heather snuck out in her PJ's, which consisted of dark grey fuzzy leopard pattern pants and a blue tank top with a howling wolf's head on it that said she-wolf. Heather picked up her wand, and crept across the tower room, down the spiral staircase, and into the Gryffindor common room. Ron was there, waiting for her. A few embers were still glowing in the fireplace, turning all the armchairs into hunched black shadows. They had almost reached the portrait hole when a voice spoke from the chair nearest them, "I can't believe you're going to do this, Heather." A lamp flickered on. It was Hermione Granger, wearing a pink bathrobe and a frown.

"You!" said Ron furiously. "Go back to bed!"

"I almost told your brother," Hermione snapped, "Percy — he's a prefect, he'd put a stop to this."

Heather couldn't believe anyone could be so interfering.

"Come on," she said to Ron. She pushed open the portrait of the Fat Lady and climbed through the hole.

Hermione wasn't going to give up that easily. She followed Ron through the portrait hole, hissing at them like an angry goose.

"Don't you care about Gryffindor, do you only care about yourselves, I don't want Slytherin to win the house cup, and you'll lose all the points I got from Professor McGonagall for knowing about Switching Spells."

"Go away."

"All right, but I warned you, you just remember what I said when you're on the train home tomorrow, you're so —"

But what they were, they didn't find out. Hermione had turned to the portrait of the Fat Lady to get back inside and found herself facing an empty painting. The Fat Lady had gone on a nighttime visit and Hermione was locked out of Gryffindor tower.

"Now what am I going to do?" she asked shrilly.

"That's your problem," said Ron. "We've got to go; we're going to be late."

They hadn't even reached the end of the corridor when Hermione caught up with them.

"I'm coming with you," she said.

"You are not."

"D'you think I'm going to stand out here and wait for Filch to catch me? If he finds all three of us I'll tell him the truth, that I was trying to stop you, and you can back me up."

"You've got some nerve —" said Ron loudly.

"Shut up, both of you!" said Heather sharply. "I heard something."

It was a sort of snuffling.

"Mrs. Norris?" breathed Ron, squinting through the dark.

It wasn't Mrs. Norris. It was Neville. He was curled up on the floor, fast asleep, but jerked suddenly awake as they crept nearer.

"Thank goodness you found me! I've been out here for hours; I couldn't remember the new password to get in to bed."

"Keep your voice down, Neville. The password's 'Pig snout' but it won't help you now; the Fat Lady's gone off somewhere."

"How's your arm?" said Heather.

"Fine," said Neville, showing them. "Madam Pomfrey mended it in about a minute. Thanks again for returning my Remembrall."

"Good — well, look, Neville, we've got to be somewhere, we'll see you later —"

"Don't leave me!" said Neville, scrambling to his feet, "I don't want to stay here alone, the Bloody Baron's been past twice already."

Ron looked at his watch and then glared furiously at Hermione and Neville.

"If either of you get us caught, I'll never rest until I've learned that Curse of the Bogies Quirrell told us about, and used it on you."

Hermione opened her mouth, perhaps to tell Ron exactly how to use the Curse of the Bogies, but Heather hissed at her to be quiet and beckoned them all forward.

They flitted along corridors striped with bars of moonlight from the high windows. At every turn Heather expected to run into Filch or Mrs. Norris, but they were lucky. They sped up a staircase to the third floor and tiptoed toward the trophy room.

Malfoy and Crabbe weren't there yet.

The crystal trophy cases glimmered where the moonlight caught them. Cups, shields, plates, and statues winked silver and gold in the darkness. They edged along the walls, keeping their eyes on the doors at either end of the room. Heather took out her wand in case Malfoy leapt in and started at once.

The minutes crept by.

"He's late, maybe he's chickened out," Ron whispered.

Then a noise in the next room made them jump. Heather had only just raised her wand when they heard someone speak — and it wasn't Malfoy.

"Sniff around, my sweet, they might be lurking in a corner."

It was Filch speaking to Mrs. Norris. Horror-struck, Heather waved madly at the other three to follow her as quickly as possible; they scurried silently toward the door, away from Filch's voice. Neville's robes had barely whipped round the corner when they heard Filch enter the trophy room.

"They're in here somewhere," they heard him mutter, "probably hiding."

"This way!" Heather mouthed to the others and, petrified, they began to creep down a long gallery full of suits of armor. They could hear Filch getting nearer. Neville suddenly let out a frightened squeak and broke into a run he tripped, grabbed Ron around the waist, and the pair of them toppled right into a suit of armor. The clanging and crashing were enough to wake the whole castle.

"Come on!" Heather said, and the four of them sprinted down the gallery, not looking back to see whether Filch was following — they swung around the doorpost and galloped down one corridor then another, Heather in the lead, without any idea where they were or where they were going — they ripped through a tapestry and found themselves in a hidden passageway, hurtled along it and came out near their Charms classroom, which they knew was miles from the trophy room.

"I think we've lost him," Heather panted, leaning against the cold wall. Neville was bent double, wheezing and spluttering.

"I —told — you," Hermione gasped, clutching at the stitch in her chest, "I — told — you."

"We've got to get back to Gryffindor tower," said Ron, "quickly as possible."

"Malfoy tricked you," Hermione said to Heather. "You realize that, don't you? He was never going to meet you — Filch knew someone was going to be in the trophy room, Malfoy must have tipped him off."

Heather knew she right, but she wasn't going to tell her that.

"Let's go."

It wasn't going to be that simple. They hadn't gone more than a dozen paces when a doorknob rattled and something came shooting out of a classroom in front of them.

It was Peeves.

He caught sight of them and gave a squeal of delight.

"Shut up, Peeves — please — you'll get us thrown out."

Peeves cackled.

"Wandering around at midnight, Ickle Firsties? Tut, tut, tut. Naughty, naughty, you'll get caughty."

"Not if you don't give us away, Peeves, please."

"Should tell Filch, I should," said Peeves in a saintly voice, but his eyes glittered wickedly. "It's for your own good, you know."

"Get out of the way," snapped Ron, taking a swipe at Peeves this was a big mistake.

"STUDENTS OUT OF BED!" Peeves bellowed, "STUDENTS OUT OF BED DOWN THE CHARMS CORRIDOR!"

Ducking under Peeves, they ran for their lives, right to the end of the corridor where they slammed into a door — and it was locked.

"This is it!" Ron moaned, as they pushed helplessly at the door, "We're done for! This is the end!"

"Drama queen." Heather muttered under her breath. They could hear footsteps, Filch running as fast as he could toward Peeves's shouts.

"Oh, move over," Hermione snarled.

She grabbed Heather's wand, tapped the lock, and whispered, "Alohomora!"

The lock clicked and the door swung open — they piled through it, shut it quickly, and pressed their ears against it, listening.

"Which way did they go, Peeves?" Filch was saying. "Quick, tell me."

"Say 'please.'"

"Don't mess with me, Peeves, now where did they go?"

"Shan't say nothing if you don't say please," said Peeves in his annoying singsong voice.

"All right —please."

"NOTHING! Ha haaa! Told you I wouldn't say nothing if you didn't say please! Ha ha! Haaaaaa!" And they heard the sound of Peeves whooshing away and Filch cursing in rage.

"He thinks this door is locked," Heather whispered. "I think we'll be okay — get off, Neville!" For Neville had been tugging Heather's arm for the last minute. "What?"

Heather turned around — and saw, quite clearly, what. For a moment, she was sure she'd walked into a nightmare — this was too much, on top of everything that had happened so far. They weren't in a room, as she had supposed. They were in a corridor. The forbidden corridor on the third floor. And now they knew why it was forbidden.

They were looking straight into the eyes of a monstrous dog, a dog that filled the whole space between ceiling and floor. It had three heads. Three pairs of rolling, mad eyes; three noses, twitching and quivering in their direction; three drooling mouths, saliva hanging in slippery ropes from yellowish fangs.

It was standing quite still, all six eyes staring at them, and Heather knew that the only reason they weren't already dead was that their sudden appearance had taken it by surprise, but it was quickly getting over that, there was no mistaking what those thunderous growls meant.

Heather groped for the doorknob — between Filch and death, she'd take Filch. She had fought many creatures but she wasn't stupid enough to take a three headed dog by herself.

They fell backward — Heather slammed the door shut, and they ran, they almost flew, back down the corridor. Filch must have hurried off to look for them somewhere else, because they didn't see him anywhere, but they hardly cared — all they wanted to do was put as much space as possible between them and that monster. They didn't stop running until they reached the portrait of the Fat Lady on the seventh floor.

"Where on earth have you all been?" she asked, looking at their bathrobes/PJ's hanging off their shoulders and their flushed, sweaty faces.

"Never mind that — pig snout, pig snout," panted Heather, and the portrait swung forward. They scrambled into the common room and collapsed, trembling, into armchairs.

It was a while before any of them said anything. Neville, indeed, looked as if he'd never speak again.

"What do they think they're doing, keeping a thing like that locked up in a school?" said Ron finally. "If any dog needs exercise, that one does."

Hermione had got both her breath and her bad temper back again. "You don't use your eyes, any of you, do you?" she snapped. "Didn't you see what it was standing on?"

"The floor?" Heather suggested. "I wasn't looking at its feet; I was too busy with its heads."

"No, not the floor. It was standing on a trapdoor. It's obviously guarding something." She stood up, glaring at them. "I hope you're pleased with yourselves. We could all have been killed — or worse, expelled. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to bed."

Ron stared after her, his mouth open. "No, we don't mind," he said. "You'd think we dragged her along, wouldn't you."

But Hermione had given Heather something else to think about as she climbed back into bed, ignoring Hermione's glares like she had a feeling that she would be doing for a while. The dog was guarding something… What had Hagrid said? Gringotts was the safest place in the world for something you wanted to hide — except perhaps Hogwarts. It looked as though Heather had found out where the grubby little package from vault seven hundred and thirteen was.


	8. Halloween

Malfoy couldn't believe his eyes when he saw that Heather and Ron were still at Hogwarts the next day, looking tired but perfectly cheerful. Indeed, by the next morning Heather and Ron thought that meeting the three-headed dog had been an excellent adventure, and they were quite keen to have another one.

In the meantime, Heather filled Ron in about the package that seemed to have been moved from Gringotts to Hogwarts, and they spent a lot of time wondering what could possibly need such heavy protection.

"It's either really valuable or really dangerous," said Ron.

"Or both," said Heather.

Heather remembered the scent of the object but that didn't give her any hint. But as all they knew for sure about the mysterious object was that it was about two inches long, they didn't have much chance of guessing what it was without further clues. Neither Neville nor Hermione showed the slightest interest in what lay underneath the dog and the trapdoor. All Neville cared about was never going near the dog again.

Hermione was now refusing to speak to Heather and Ron, but she was such a bossy know-it-all that they saw this as an added bonus. All they really wanted now was a way of getting back at Malfoy, and to their great delight, just such a thing arrived in the mail about a week later.

As the owls flooded into the Great Hall as usual, everyone's attention was caught at once by a long, thin package carried by six large screech owls. Heather was just as interested as everyone else to see what was in this large parcel, and was amazed when the owls soared down and dropped it right in front of him, knocking her bacon to the floor. They had hardly fluttered out of the way when another owl dropped a letter on top of the parcel.

Heather ripped open the letter first, which was lucky, because it said:

DO NOT OPEN THE PARCEL AT THE TABLE.

It contains your new Nimbus Two Thousand, but I don't want everybody knowing you've got a broomstick or they'll all want one.

Oliver Wood will meet you tonight on the Quidditch field at seven o'clock for your first training session.

Professor McGonagall

Heather had difficulty hiding her glee as she handed the note to Ron to read.

"A Nimbus Two Thousand!" Ron moaned enviously. "I've never even touched one."

They left the hallway quickly, wanting to unwrap the broomstick in private before their first class, but half way across the entrance hall they found the way upstairs barred by Crabbe and Goyle. Malfoy seized the package from Heather and felt it.

"That's a broomstick," he said, throwing it back to Heather with a mixture of jealousy and spite on his face. "You'll be in for it this time, Potter, first years aren't allowed them."

Ron couldn't resist it.

"It's not any old broomstick," he said, "It's a Nimbus Two Thousand. What did you say you've got at home, Malfoy, a Comet Two Sixty?" Ron grinned at Heather. "Comets look flashy, but they're not in the same league as the Nimbus."

"What would you know about it, Weasley, you couldn't afford half the handle," Malfoy snapped back. "I suppose you and your brothers have to save up twig by twig.

Before Ron could answer, Professor Flitwick appeared at Malfoy's elbow.

"Not arguing, I hope, boys, and girl?" he squeaked.

"Potter's been sent a broomstick, professor." said Malfoy quickly.

"Yes, yes, that's right," said Professor Flitwick, beaming at Heather. "Professor McGonagall told me all about the special circumstances, Potter. What model is it?"

"A Nimbus Two Thousand, sir," said Heather, fighting not to laugh at the look of horror on Malfoy's face. "And it's really thanks to Malfoy here that I've got it," she added.

She walked over to Malfoy, stood next to the Slytherin and put an arm around his neck and shoulders. She stood really close to him, much to his discomfort and Heather's amusement. She quickly discovered that making Malfoy uncomfortable was her new favorite activity.

"If he hadn't thrown the Remembrall I wouldn't have had to catch it." She then smirked at Malfoy's horrified and enraged expression as she twirled a piece of his blonde hair at the nape of his neck with one of her fingers. Professor Flitwick seemed very happy about a Slytherin/Gryffindor friendship, even though it was totally false.

"I start training tonight. Thanks Malfoy, thanks to you I'm on the Quidditch team." Just to rub it in a little more she kissed him on the cheek and ran up the stairs, Ron right on her heels. Both of them were smothering their laughter at Malfoy's obvious rage and confusion.

"Well it's true," Heather chortled as they reached the top of the marble staircase, "If he hadn't stolen Neville's Remembrall I wouldn't be on the team..."

"So I suppose you think that's a reward for breaking the rules?" Came an angry voice from just behind them. Hermione was stomping up the stairs, looking disapprovingly at the package in Heather's hand.

"No. In a nutshell, personally I consider him a cancer and better removed, avoided - and the less anyone heard of him or his supporters the better. Besides I thought you weren't speaking to us?" said Heather.

"Yes, don't stop now;" said Ron, "it's doing us so much good."

Hermione marched away with her nose up in the air. Heather had a lot of trouble keeping her mind on his lessons that day. It kept wandering up to the dormitory where her new broomstick was lying under her bed, or straying off to the Quidditch field where she'd be learning to play that night.

She ate her fill of the elk as fast as she could that evening and then rushed upstairs with Ron to unwrap the Nimbus Two Thousand at last. Ron was apprehensive of going into the girl's dormitory at first but followed Heather when she called him a chicken.

"Wow," Ron sighed, as the broomstick rolled onto Heather's bedspread.

Even Heather, who knew nothing about the different brooms, thought it looked wonderful. Sleek and shiny, with a mahogany handle, it had a long tail of neat, straight twigs and Nimbus Two Thousand written in gold near the top.

As seven o'clock drew nearer, Heather left the castle and set off in the dusk toward the Quidditch field. She'd never been inside the stadium before. Hundreds of seats were raised in stands around the field so that the spectators were high enough to see what was going on. At either end of the field were three golden poles with hoops on the end. They reminded Heather of the little plastic sticks Muggle children blew bubbles through, except that they were fifty feet high.

Too eager to fly again to wait for Wood, Heather mounted her broomstick and kicked off from the ground. What a feeling — she swooped in and out of the goal posts and then sped up and down the field. The Nimbus Two Thousand turned wherever she wanted at her lightest touch. It was definitely much better than the school brooms.

"Hey, Potter, come down!"

Oliver Wood had arrived. He was carrying a large wooden crate under his arm. Heather landed next to him.

"Very nice," said Wood, his eyes glinting. "I see what McGonagall meant…you really are a natural. I'm just going to teach you the rules this evening, and then you'll be joining team practice three times a week."

He opened the crate. Inside were four different-sized balls.

"Right," said Wood. "Now, Quidditch is easy enough to understand, even if it's not too easy to play. There are seven players on each side. Three of them are called Chasers."

"Three Chasers," Heather repeated, as Wood took out a bright red ball about the size of a soccer ball.

"This ball's called the Quaffle," said Wood. "The Chasers throw the Quaffle to each other and try and get it through one of the hoops to score a goal. Ten points every time the Quaffle goes through one of the hoops. Follow me?"

"The Chasers throw the Quaffle and put it through the hoops to score," Heather recited. "So — that's sort of like basketball on broomsticks with six hoops, isn't it?"

"What's basketball?" said Wood curiously.

"I'll tell you later," said Heather quickly.

"Now, there's another player on each side who's called the Keeper — I'm Keeper for Gryffindor. I have to fly around our hoops and stop the other team from scoring."

"Three Chasers, one Keeper," said Heather, who was determined to remember it all. "And they play with the Quaffle. Okay, got that. So what are they for?" She pointed at the three balls left inside the box.

"I'll show you now," said Wood. "Take this."

He handed Heather a small club, a bit like a short baseball bat.

"I'm going to show you what the Bludgers do," Wood said. "These two are the Bludgers."

He showed Heather two identical balls, jet black and slightly smaller than the red Quaffle. Heather noticed that they seemed to be straining to escape the straps holding them inside the box.

"Stand back," Wood warned Heather. He bent down and freed one of the Bludgers.

At once, the black ball rose high in the air and then pelted straight at Heather's face. Heather swung at it with the bat to stop it from breaking her nose, and sent it zigzagging away into the air — it zoomed around their heads and then shot at Wood, who dived on top of it and managed to pin it to the ground.

"See?" Wood panted, forcing the struggling Bludger back into the crate and strapping it down safely. "The Bludgers rocket around, trying to knock players off their brooms. That's why you have two Beaters on each team — the Weasley twins are ours — it's their job to protect their side from the Bludgers and try and knock them toward the other team. So — think you've got all that?"

"Three Chasers try and score with the Quaffle; the Keeper guards the goal posts; the Beaters keep the Bludgers away from their team," Heather reeled off.

"Very good," said Wood.

"Er — have the Bludgers ever killed anyone?" Heather asked, it seemed quite obvious that they had the potential to do so.

"Never at Hogwarts. We've had a couple of broken jaws but nothing worse than that. Now, the last member of the team is the Seeker. That's you. And you don't have to worry about the Quaffle or the Bludgers —"

"— unless they crack my head open."

"Don't worry, the Weasleys are more than a match for the Bludgers — I mean, they're like a pair of human Bludgers themselves." Heather smiled and chuckled in agreement.

Wood reached into the crate and took out the fourth and last ball. Compared with the Quaffle and the Bludgers, it was tiny, about the size of a large walnut. It was bright gold and had little fluttering silver wings.

"This," said Wood, "is the Golden Snitch, and it's the most important ball of the lot. It's very hard to catch because it's so fast and difficult to see. It's the Seeker's job to catch it. You've got to weave in and out of the Chasers, Beaters, Bludgers, and Quaffle to get it before the other team's Seeker, because whichever Seeker catches the Snitch wins his team an extra hundred and fifty points, so they nearly always win. That's why Seekers get fouled so much. A game of Quidditch only ends when the Snitch is caught, so it can go on for ages — I think the record is three months, they had to keep bringing on substitutes so the players could get some sleep. Well, that's it any questions?"

Heather shook her head. She understood what she had to do all right; it was fairly simple but she wouldn't say it was going to be easy.

"We won't practice with the Snitch yet," said Wood, carefully shutting it back inside the crate, "it's too dark, we might lose it. Let's try you out with a few of these."

He pulled a bag of ordinary golf balls out of his pocket and a few minutes later, he and Heather were up in the air, Wood throwing the golf balls as hard as he could in every direction for Heather to catch. Heather didn't miss a single one, and Wood was delighted. After half an hour, night had really fallen and they couldn't carry on.

"That Quidditch Cup'll have our name on it this year," said Wood happily as they trudged back up to the castle. "I wouldn't be surprised if you turn out better than Charlie Weasley, and he could have played for England if he hadn't gone off chasing dragons."

Perhaps it was because she was now so busy, what with Quidditch practice three evenings a week on top of all her homework, but Heather could hardly believe it when she realized that she'd already been at Hogwarts two months.

Her lessons, too, were becoming more and more interesting now that they had mastered the basics. On Halloween morning they woke to the delicious smell of baking pumpkin wafting through the corridors.

Even better, Professor Flitwick announced in Charms that he thought they were ready to start making objects fly, something they had all been dying to try since they'd seen him make Neville's toad zoom around the classroom.

Professor Flitwick put the class into pairs to practice. Heather's partner was Seamus Finnigan (which was a relief, because Neville had been trying to catch her eye). Ron, however, was to be working with Hermione Granger. It was hard to tell whether Ron or Hermione was angrier about this. She hadn't spoken to either of them since the day Heather's broomstick had arrived.

"Now, don't forget that nice wrist movement we've been practicing!" squeaked Professor Flitwick, perched on top of his pile of books as usual. "Swish and flick, remember, swish and flick. And saying the magic words properly is very important, too — never forget Wizard Baruffio, who said 's' instead of 'f' and found himself on the floor with a buffalo on his chest."

It was very difficult. Heather and Seamus swished and flicked, but the feather they were supposed to be sending skyward just lay on the desktop. Heather was able to get her's to move more than Seamus but it wasn't quite the result she wanted. Seamus got so impatient that he prodded it with his wand and set fire to it — Heather had to put it out with her hat.

Ron, at the next table, wasn't having much more luck.

"Wingardium Leviosa!" he shouted, waving his long arms like a windmill.

"You're saying it wrong," Heather heard Hermione snap. "It's Wing-gar-dium Levi-o-sa, make the 'gar' nice and long."

"You do it, then, if you're so clever," Ron snarled.

Hermione rolled up the sleeves of her gown, flicked her wand, and said, "Wingardium Leviosa!"

Their feather rose off the desk and hovered about four feet above their heads.

"Oh, well done!" cried Professor Flitwick, clapping. "Everyone see here, Miss Granger's done it!"

Ron was in a very bad mood by the end of the class.

"It's no wonder no one can stand her," he said to Heather as they pushed their way into the crowded corridor, "she's a nightmare, honestly."

Someone knocked into Heather as they hurried past him. It was Hermione. Heather caught a glimpse of her face — and was startled to see that she was in tears. Heather glared at Ron and smacked him hard over the head.

"She heard you."

"So?" said Ron, rubbing the back of his head but he looked a bit uncomfortable. "She must've noticed she's got no friends."

She had half the mind to take a nick out of his ear but since she would get in trouble for that, Heather settled smacking him again several times. "Don't *smack* make *smack* girls *smack* cry." She growled.

Hermione didn't turn up for the next class and wasn't seen all afternoon. On their way down to the Great Hall for the Halloween feast, Heather and Ron overheard Parvati Patil telling her friend Lavender that Hermione was crying in the girls' bathroom and wanted to be left alone. Ron looked still more awkward at this, Heather glared at him again and smacked him hard over the head but a moment later they had entered the Great Hall, where the Halloween decorations put Hermione out of their minds. Heather decided she could stay for the Halloween feast; the elk could wait until tomorrow.

A thousand live bats fluttered from the walls and ceiling while a thousand more swooped over the tables in low black clouds, making the candles in the pumpkins stutter. The feast appeared suddenly on the golden plates, as it had at the start-of-term banquet.

Heather was just helping herself to a baked potato when Professor Quirrell came sprinting into the hall, his turban askew and terror on his face. Everyone stared as he reached Professor Dumbledore's chair, slumped against the table, and gasped, "Troll — in the dungeons — thought you ought to know."

He then sank to the floor in a dead faint.

There was an uproar. It took several purple firecrackers exploding from the end of Professor Dumbledore's wand to bring silence.

"Prefects," he rumbled, "lead your Houses back to the dormitories immediately!"

Percy was in his element.

"Follow me! Stick together, first years! No need to fear the troll if you follow my orders! Stay close behind me, now. Make way, first years coming through! Excuse me, I'm a prefect!"

"How could a troll get in?" Heather asked as they climbed the stairs.

"Don't ask me, they're supposed to be really stupid," said Ron. "Maybe Peeves let it in for a Halloween joke."

They passed different groups of people hurrying in different directions. As they jostled their way through a crowd of confused Hufflepuffs, Heather suddenly grabbed Ron's arm.

"I've just thought — Hermione."

"What about her?"

"She doesn't know about the troll."

Ron bit his lip. Heather glared at him and raised her hand threateningly.

"Oh, all right," he snapped. "But Percy'd better not see us."

Ducking down, they joined the Hufflepuffs going the other way, slipped down a deserted side corridor, and hurried off toward the girls' bathroom. They had just turned the corner when they heard quick footsteps behind them.

"Percy!" hissed Ron, pulling Heather behind a large stone griffin.

Peering around it, however, they saw not Percy but Snape. He crossed the corridor and disappeared from view.

"What's he doing?" Heather whispered. "Why isn't he down in the dungeons with the rest of the teachers?"

"Search me."

Quietly as possible, they crept along the next corridor after Snape's fading footsteps.

"He's heading for the third floor," Heather said, she took a step forward but a horrible smell hit her nose. She covered it and gagged. It smelled like a mixture of old socks and the kind of public toilet no one seems to clean. Ron smelled it to and covered his nose.

And then they heard it — a low grunting, and the shuffling footfalls of gigantic feet. Ron pointed — at the end of a passage to the left, something huge was moving toward them. They shrank into the shadows and watched as it emerged into a patch of moonlight.

It was a horrible sight. Twelve feet tall, its skin was a dull, granite gray, its great lumpy body like a boulder with its small bald head perched on top like a coconut. It had short legs thick as tree trunks with flat, horny feet. The smell coming from it was incredible. It was holding a huge wooden club, which dragged along the floor because its arms were so long. The troll stopped next to a doorway and peered inside. It waggled its long ears, making up its tiny mind, and then slouched slowly into the room. They soon realized what room it was when they heard a high pitched scream.

"Oh, no," said Ron, pale as the Bloody Baron.

"It's the girls' bathroom!" Heather gasped.

"Hermione!" they said together.

Wheeling around, Heather sprinted to the door and ran inside, Ron close behind. Hermione Granger was shrinking against the wall opposite, looking as if she was about to faint. The troll was advancing on her, knocking the sinks off the walls as it went. Heather morphed into her wolf form.

"Confuse it!" Heather said desperately to Ron, and, ran around in front of it and snarled. The troll stopped a few feet from Hermione. Its mean little eyes saw Heather. It hesitated, and then made for her instead, lifting its club as it went.

"Oi, pea-brain!" yelled Ron from the other side of the chamber, and he threw a metal pipe at it. The troll didn't even seem to notice the pipe hitting its shoulder, but it heard the yell and paused again, turning its ugly snout toward Ron instead, giving Heather time to run around it.

"Come on, hop on!" Heather yelled at Hermione, scurrying between her legs and then standing up to her full height she ran the girl to the exit with her on her back. Hermione screamed and grabbed onto Heather's fur, pulling on it painfully but the she-wolf ignored it. Heather let Hermione dismount her before running at the troll.

The troll was ridiculously slow. The red wolf leapt up and sank her fangs into the trolls shoulder. Blood squirted out and it tasted disgusting. Heather let go and front flipped back on to the floor. She ran forward again, leapt up and bit the troll's neck. The troll flailed around, trying to shake Heather off. She gripped hard with her claws, trying to stay on. The troll used it's arm and knocked Heather away, sending her flying into the wall. Heather landed on the ground a little dazed. She shook herself and saw the troll standing over her, it's club raised.

Hermione had sunk to the floor in fright; Ron pulled out his own wand — not knowing what he was going to do he heard himself cry the first spell that came into his head: "Wingardium Leviosa!"

The club suddenly out of the troll's hand, rose high, high up into the air, turned slowly over — and dropped, with a sickening crack, onto its owner's head. The troll swayed on the spot and then fell flat forward. Heather leapt up towards the troll and sank her teeth into its neck. She crushed its windpipe and it fell backwards. The landing made a noise so loud it seemed to shake the room. Heather let go of the troll's neck, her jaws dripping with the disgusting blood. She then shifted into her human form.

Heather got to her feet. She was shaking and out of breath. Ron was standing there with his wand still raised, staring at what he had done.

It was Hermione who spoke first.

"Is it — dead?"

"Yes," Heather said. Her finger tips were dripping with blood, her teeth were covered and it was also dripping down her chin.

A sudden slamming and loud footsteps made the three of them look up. They hadn't realized what a racket they had been making, but of course, someone downstairs must have heard the crashes and the troll's roars. A moment later, Professor McGonagall had come bursting into the room, closely followed by Snape, with Quirrell bringing up the rear. Quirrell took one look at the troll, let out a faint whimper, and sat quickly down on a toilet, clutching his heart.

Snape bent over the troll. Professor McGonagall was looking at Ron and Heather. Heather had never seen her look so angry. Her lips were white. Her eyes were a little fearful at the blood that was dripping from one of her cubs. Hopes of winning fifty points for Gryffindor faded quickly from Heather's mind.

"What on earth were you thinking of?" said Professor McGonagall, with cold fury in her voice. Heather looked at Ron, who was still standing with his wand in the air. "You're lucky you weren't killed. Why aren't you in your dormitory?"

Snape gave Heather a swift, piercing look. Heather first walked over to Ron and pushed his arm down, he was still holding it above his head. She then turned to the professors and began her explanation.

"We were going up to the common room but I remember hearing over dinner that Hermione was crying (Hermione blushed) because Mr. No-Sensitivity-Or-Inside-Voice here," Heather pointed to Ron, who looked very sheepish. "Said something rather hurtful which Hermione overheard. Hermione here didn't know about the troll so me and Ron came down here to warn her, only to find the troll in here, now," Heather held up a finger for Mc Gonagall to wait, "we didn't go find a teacher because she could have been killed by the time we brought you here. Ron and I confused the troll while I was able to get Hermione to safety. I then ran at the troll and sank my teeth into it's shoulder as you'll see the wound here." Heather pointed out the still bleeding gash in the dead troll's shoulder.

"I then landed on the ground and attacked again, this time biting its neck. It thrashed around while I tried to keep a firm grip. It flung me off and into the wall. I was dazed and then when the troll was about to hit me with its club Ron preformed the levitation charm we learned today in class. He levitated the club out of the troll's hand and let it fall on it's head. I then pounced again and sank my teeth into it's neck, killing it." Heather finished.

The Professors's all seemed in a state of shock. While Mc Gonagall gathered herself Heather wiped off the blood on her face with the back of her hand. She really wanted to wash the disgusting blood from her mouth.

"Well, it seems you had a good reason for not being in your dorms. Ms. Potter, twenty points will be awarded to both you and Mr. Weasley," said Professor Mc Gonagall "If you're not hurt at all, you'd better get off to Gryffindor tower. Students are finishing the feast in their houses. Ms. Potter, I will take you down to the Hospital Wing to be checked over."

Heather followed Professor Mc Gonagall down to the hospital wing. Madam Pomfrey had checked her over and gave her medicine for the large bruise on her back. She also cleaned up all the troll blood.

After that Heather hurried out of the chamber and didn't speak at all until they had climbed two floors up. It was a relief to be away from the smell of the troll, quite apart from anything else.

She had reached the portrait of the Fat Lady, where Ron was waiting

"Pig snout," they said and entered.

The common room was packed and noisy. Everyone was eating the food that had been sent up. Hermione, however, stood alone by the door, waiting for them. There was a very embarrassed pause. Then, none of them looking at each other, they all said "Thanks," and hurried off to get plates.

But from that moment on, Hermione Granger became their friend. There are some things you can't share without ending up liking each other, and knocking out a twelve-foot mountain troll is one of them.


	9. The Rouge Bludger

**I own nothing except Heather, Kingu belongs to SevLoverKat. Sorry of or the delay, I love all toy reviewers, more are always welcome. OC's are no longer needed, I have enough, thank you for all submissions, enjoy the chapter.**

As they entered November, the weather turned very cold.

The mountains around the school became icy gray and the lake like chilled steel.

Every morning the ground was covered in frost. Hagrid could be seen from the upstairs windows defrosting broomsticks on the Quidditch field, bundled up in a long moleskin overcoat, rabbit fur gloves, and enormous beaver skin boots.

The Quidditch season had begun.

On Saturday, Heather would be playing in her first match after weeks of training: Gryffindor versus Slytherin. If Gryffindor won, they would move up into second place in the house championship.

Hardly anyone had seen Heather play because Wood had decided that, as their secret weapon, Heather should be kept, well, secret. But the news that she was playing Seeker had leaked out somehow, and Heather didn't know which was worse — people telling her she'd be brilliant or people telling her they'd be running around underneath her holding a mattress. Those people ended up getting a set of fangs flashed in their face. That teamed up with some snarling sent them running away like sissies.

It was really lucky that Heather now had Hermione as a friend. She didn't know how she'd have gotten through all her homework without her, what with all the last-minute Quidditch practice Wood was making them do. She had also lent her Quidditch Through the Ages, which turned out to be a very interesting read.

Heather learned that there were seven hundred ways of committing a Quidditch foul and that all of them had happened during a World Cup match in 1473; that Seekers were usually the smallest and fastest players, and that most serious Quidditch accidents seemed to happen to them; that although people rarely died playing Quidditch, referees had been known to vanish and turn up months later in the Sahara Desert.

Hermione had become a bit more relaxed about breaking rules since Heather and Ron had saved her from the mountain troll, and she was much nicer for it. The day before Heather's first Quidditch match the three of them were out in the freezing courtyard during break, and she had conjured them up a bright blue fire that could be carried around in a jam jar.

They were standing with their backs to it, getting warm, when Snape crossed the yard. Heather noticed at once that Snape was limping.

Heather, Ron, and Hermione moved closer together to block the fire from view; they were sure it wouldn't be allowed.

Unfortunately, something about their guilty faces caught Snape's eye. He limped over. He hadn't seen the fire, but he seemed to be looking for a reason to tell them off anyway.

"What's that you've got there, Potter?"

It was Quidditch Through the Ages. Heather showed him.

"Library books are not to be taken outside the school," said Snape. "Give it to me. Five points from Gryffindor."

"He's just made that rule up," Heather muttered angrily as Snape limped away. "Wonder what's wrong with his leg?"

"Dunno, but I hope it's really hurting him," said Ron bitterly.

"Maybe he pulled it or something?" Heather suggested.

On a lighter note Heather had received a letter from her pack that they had a new member. During lunch Heather got a letter from her pack. At first it seemed like the usual letter, questions from everyone (Blaze was interested in learning about potions, specifically anything to do with healing since she was the medicine wolf), prey was running well despite the cold weather. But then they started saying how they found a young wolf on the edge of the territory. He was young, not as old as Toboe but a little older than Heather. They described him as having golden brown fur and amber eyes. His name was Kingu, meaning 'King' in Japanese. Apparently he had escaped from human hunters that had killed his family a few hours prior. It was really windy and cold that day so he had caught a cold but he was better now and settling in well. In fact, he had even written a little message for Heather.

Dear Heather,

Well, I don't really know what to say other than I hope you're doing okay and I look forward to meeting you. The pack has talked a lot about you and I look forward towards December, when you get time off from the human magic school. I'm not really sure how I feel about you being the child of humans but I personally don't think blood matters, or family names, it's what you do with the name that is important. (Hermione and Ron agreed with him, as they were reading over her shoulders) I look forward to fighting and hunting alongside you.

Your packmate,

Kingu

"Well he seems nice." Heather said, folding up the letter and putting it in her pocket.

"Maybe you'll meet him at the platform when you head home for Christmas." Hermione said.

"Just out of curiosity Heather, what is home for you?" Ron asked.

Heather went into what her life was like in her home territory. She described certain spots that had recently earned names. Towards the southern border were the Moonlit Rocks. It was a few large slabs of bone white rocks that shone in the moonlight, the howling spot where the pack went to howl during the full moon. There was actually one rock that jutted high above all the others where Kiba would stand, there was also a little outcrop just below him where Tsume would sit. To the east was the Crystal River, it was the eastern border for the territory and the main source of water, other than the few streams that ran throughout the territory. The Crystal River though had the best tasting water which was pure, crisp tasting and shone brightly in the sunlight, hence the name and in the water swam fish, in Heather's opinion, the longer trip to get to the river was always well worth it.

In the southwestern area of the territory was a most treasured spot, The Lunar Flower Meadows. A clearing of green grass filled with Lunar Flowers. It was a great relaxation spot, and a great play area for Hige and Blue's future pups. Even though they didn't say they were going to have any, Heather knew it was only a matter of time. To the west was a road that lead to a human city, it wasn't big and busy but it wasn't small either, it was like a rest stop for traveling humans. They only went there once but it wasn't bad, in fact, it would be a great meeting place for Hermione and Ron to meet up. Finally, to the north were the Shadowed Pines. It was an area where the oak trees suddenly changed into a dense pine forest where little light shines down. But it was a popular spot for big game, and bears. The pack never went deep into the forest but the risk was well worth anytime one of them came home dragging a caribou behind them.

The Gryffindor common room was very noisy that evening. Heather, Ron, and Hermione sat together next to a window. Hermione was checking Heather and Ron's Charms homework for them. She would never let them copy, but by asking her to read it through, they got the right answers anyway.

Heather felt restless. She wanted Quidditch Through the Ages back, to take her mind off her nerves about tomorrow. Why should she be afraid of Snape?

Getting up, she told Ron and Hermione she was going to ask Snape if she could have it.

"Better you than me," they said together, but Heather had an idea that Snape wouldn't refuse if there were other teachers listening.

She made her way down to the staffroom. On the way down she picked up on the scent of blood, human blood to be exact. Heather walked up to the door and knocked. There was no answer. She knocked again. Nothing.

Perhaps Snape had left the book in there? It was worth a try. She pushed the door ajar and peered inside – and a horrible scene met her eyes. Snape and Filch were inside, alone.

Snape was holding his robes above his knees. One of his legs was bloody and mangled. Filch was handing Snape bandages.

"Blasted thing," Snape was saying. "How are you supposed to keep your eyes on all three heads at once?"

"POTTER!"

Snape's face was twisted with fury as he dropped his robes quickly to hide his leg. Heather took a step inside.

"Are you alright Professor?"

"GET OUT! OUT! "

Heather took another step inside. "You're injured. I could smell the blood all the way down the hall."

"Leave!" Filch shouted.

Heather glared at the care taker from the corner of her eye and turned back to Snape, who looked about ready to strangle her. "Professor Snape I already know that the three headed dog bit you. I can smell the dog slobber. You don't need to tell me why you were there, but at least let me help you." Said Heather.

Snape was silent for a long time. He kept staring at her, probably shocked that she stood up to him and Filch at the same time, something that no student had ever done before. Heather just stared right back, not backing down.

Heather honestly expected Snape to yell at her again but instead he sighed in defeat. Heather allowed herself a moment of smug satisfaction before she knelt down beside Filch, who was muttering curses under his breath, and helped him bandage Snape's leg. Once she was done she stood up and began to leave. On her way out she noticed her book on an end table. She blocked it from view and slipped it into her robes. just as she was about to leave Snape spoke.

"Not a word of this to anyone Miss Potter." Snape warned.

Heather turned around and nodded her head. "Of course Professor, my lips are sealed." To prove her point she mimed zipping her lips shut, locking them and throwing them not the fire that was currently still burning. She then sprinted back upstairs. She would tell Ron and Hermione, but other than that she would keep her word.

"Did you get it?" Ron asked as Heather joined them. "What's the matter?"

In a low whisper, Heather told them what she'd seen.

"You know what this means?" she finished breathlessly. "He was in the room with that three-headed dog at Halloween! That's where he was going when we saw him!"

Hermione's eyes were wide.

"No — he wouldn't take whatever the dog is guarding," she said. "I know he's not very nice, but he wouldn't try and steal something Dumbledore was keeping safe."

"Honestly, Hermione, you think all teachers are saints or something," snapped Ron. "I'm with Heather. I wouldn't put anything past Snape. But what's he after? What's that dog guarding?"

"I never said he was trying to take it and I honestly don't think it was Snape." Heather said.

"What do you mean? It's obvious!" Ron exclaimed.

"Exactly! He was your first guess out of everyone." Heather said.

"You have a point; a smart thief wouldn't get caught." Hermione pointed out.

"But a really smart thief would make sure someone else did. Think," Heather turned to Ron, "Let's say you are trying to take the Stone Ron. You're not a likely thief but it would be great if you could cover your trail with someone else who would seem like an obvious master mind. Snape, dark, mean, biased, the Bat of the Dungeons, everyone would be pointing their fingers at him while you could get away with the stone."

"Then how do you explain how he got bit?" Hermione asked.

"Maybe he was trying to protect it from the real thief, trying to battle someone while trying to keep out of the way of three sets of snapping jaws probably isn't easy. He must've directed most of his attention at the thief and while he was distracted the dog tried to take a chunk out of his leg."

Ron was silent. "Heather, you speak like a master thief who has pulled jobs all over the world."

She shrugged. "Just think like a thief."

"Well, Snape may not be it, but he could still be trying, but even if he isn't our thief, who is?" Hermione asked.

Heather went to bed with her head buzzing with the same question. Lavender was snoring loudly, but Heather couldn't sleep. She tried to empty her mind — she needed to sleep, she had to, she had her first Quidditch match in a few hours.

The next morning dawned very bright and cold. The Great Hall was full of the delicious smell of fried sausages and the cheerful chatter of everyone looking forward to a good Quidditch match.

Heather sat in the great hall eating breakfast with Ron and Hermione. Because she was raised a wolf and had a love for meat she always had some form of said food group make up most of her meal. This morning at breakfast it was bacon.

Heather felt excited. In an hour's time she'd be walking onto the field.

"Heather, you need your strength," said Seamus Finnigan. "Seekers are always the ones who get clobbered by the other team."

"Thanks, Seamus," said Heather sarcastically, watching Seamus pile ketchup on his sausages.

By eleven o'clock the whole school seemed to be out in the stands around the Quidditch pitch. Many students had binoculars. The seats might be raised high in the air, but it was still difficult to see what was going on sometimes.

Ron and Hermione joined Neville, Seamus, and Dean the West Ham fan up in the top row. As a surprise for Heather, they had painted a large banner on one of the sheets Scabbers had ruined. It said Potter for President, and Dean, who was good at drawing, had done a large Gryffindor lion underneath with a wolf right beside it. Then Hermione had performed a tricky little charm so that the paint flashed different colors.

Meanwhile, in the locker room, Heather and the rest of the team were changing into their scarlet Quidditch robes (Slytherin would be playing in green).

Wood cleared his throat for silence.

"Okay, men," he said.

"And women," said Chaser Angelina Johnson.

"And women," Wood agreed. "This is it."

"The big one," said Fred Weasley.

"The one we've all been waiting for," said George.

"We know Oliver's speech by heart," Fred told Heather, "we were on the team last year."

"Shut up, you two," said Wood. "This is the best team Gryffindor's had in years. We're going to win. I know it."

He glared at them all as if to say, "Or else."

"Right. It's time. Good luck, all of you."

Heather followed Fred and George out of the locker room and, walked onto the field to loud cheers. Madam Hooch was refereeing. She stood in the middle of the field waiting for the two teams, her broom in her hand.

"Now, I want a nice fair game, all of you," she said, once they were all gathered around her. Heather noticed that she seemed to be speaking particularly to the Slytherin Captain, Marcus Flint, a sixth year. Heather thought Flint looked as if he had some troll blood in him.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw the fluttering banner high above, flashing Potter for President over the crowd. Her heart skipped. She felt even more excited. If she had her tail out, it would be wagging a mile a minuet.

"Mount your brooms, please."

Heather clambered onto her Nimbus Two Thousand.

Madam Hooch gave a loud blast on her silver whistle.

Fifteen brooms rose up, high, high into the air. They were off.

"And the Quaffle is taken immediately by Angelina Johnson of Gryffindor — what an excellent Chaser that girl is, and rather attractive, too —"

"JORDAN!"

"Sorry, Professor."

The Weasley twins' friend, Lee Jordan, was doing the commentary for the match, closely watched by Professor McGonagall.

"And she's really belting along up there, a neat pass to Alicia Spinnet, a good find of Oliver Wood's, last year only a reserve — back to Johnson and — no, the Slytherins have taken the Quaffle, Slytherin Captain Marcus Flint gains the Quaffle and off he goes — Flint flying like an eagle up there

- he's going to sc — no, stopped by an excellent move by Gryffindor Keeper Wood and the Gryffindors take the Quaffle — that's Chaser Katie Bell of Gryffindor there, nice dive around Flint, off up the field and — OUCH — that must have hurt, hit in the back of the head by a Bludger

Quaffle taken by the Slytherins — that's Adrian Pucey speeding off toward the goal posts, but he's blocked by a second Bludger — sent his way by Fred or George Weasley, can't tell which

— nice play by the Gryffindor Beater, anyway, and Johnson back in possession of the Quaffle, a clear field ahead and off she goes — she's really flying — dodges a speeding Bludger — the goal posts are ahead — come on, now, Angelina — Keeper Bletchley dives — misses — GRYFFINDORS SCORE!"

Gryffindor cheers filled the cold air, with boos and moans from the Slytherins.

"Budge up there, move along."

"Hagrid!"

Ron and Hermione squeezed together to give Hagrid enough space to join them.

"Bin watchin' from me hut," said Hagrid, patting a large pair of binoculars around his neck, "But it isn't the same as bein' in the crowd. No sign of the Snitch yet, eh?"

"Nope," said Ron. "Heather hasn't had much to do yet."

"Kept outta trouble, though, that's somethin'," said Hagrid, raising his binoculars and peering skyward at the speck that was Heather.

Way up above them, Heather was gliding over the game, squinting about for some sign of the Snitch. This was part of her and Wood's game plan.

"Keep out of the way until you catch sight of the Snitch," Wood had said. "We don't want you attacked before you have to be."

When Angelina had scored, Heather had done a couple of loop-the-loops to let off her feelings.

Now she was back to staring around for the Snitch. Once she caught sight of a flash of gold, but it was just a reflection from one of the Weasleys' wristwatches, and once a Bludger decided to come pelting her way, more like a cannonball than anything, but Heather dodged it and Fred Weasley came chasing after it.

"All right there, Heather?" he had time to yell, as he beat the Bludger furiously toward Marcus Flint.

"Slytherin in possession," Lee Jordan was saying, "Chaser Pucey ducks two Bludgers, two Weasleys, and Chaser Bell, and speeds toward the — wait a moment — was that the Snitch?"

A murmur ran through the crowd as Adrian Pucey dropped the Quaffle; too busy looking over his shoulder at the flash of gold that had passed his left ear.

Heather saw it. In a great rush of excitement she dived downward after the streak of gold. Slytherin Seeker Terence Higgs had seen it, too. Neck and neck they hurtled toward the Snitch — all the Chasers seemed to have forgotten what they were supposed to be doing as they hung in midair to watch.

Heather was faster than Higgs — she could see the little round ball, wings fluttering, darting up ahead — she put on an extra spurt of speed —

WHAM! A roar of rage echoed from the Gryffindors below — Marcus Flint had blocked Heather on purpose, and Heather's broom spun off course, Heather holding on for dear life.

"Foul!" screamed the Gryffindors.

Madam Hooch spoke angrily to Flint and then ordered a free shot at the goal posts for Gryffindor. But in all the confusion, of course, the Golden Snitch had disappeared from sight again.

Down in the stands, Dean Thomas was yelling, "Send him off, ref! Red card!"

"What are you talking about, Dean?" said Ron.

"Red card!" said Dean furiously. "In soccer you get shown the red card and you're out of the game!"

"But this isn't soccer, Dean," Ron reminded him.

Hagrid, however, was on Dean's side.

"They oughta change the rules. Flint coulda knocked Heather outta the air."

Lee Jordan was finding it difficult not to take sides.

"So — after that obvious and disgusting bit of cheating —"

"Jordan!" growled Professor McGonagall.

"I mean, after that open and revolting foul…"

"Jordan, I'm warning you—"

"All right, all right. Flint nearly kills the Gryffindor Seeker, which could happen to anyone, I'm sure, so a penalty to Gryffindor, taken by Spinner, who puts it away, no trouble, and we continue play, Gryffindor still in possession."

It was as Heather dodged another Bludger, which went spinning dangerously past her head, that it happened.

Her broom gave a sudden, frightening lurch. For a split second, she thought she was going to fall. Se gripped the broom tightly with both her hands and knees. She'd never felt anything like that. It happened again. It was as though the broom was trying to buck him off. But Nimbus Two Thousands did not suddenly decide to buck their riders off.

Heather tried to turn back toward the Gryffindor goal-posts — she had half a mind to ask Wood to call time-out — and then she realized that her broom was completely out of her control. She couldn't turn it. She couldn't direct it at all. It was zigzagging through the air, and every now and then making violent swishing movements that almost unseated her.

Lee was still commentating.

"Slytherin in possession — Flint with the Quaffle — passes Spinnet — passes Bell — hit hard in the face by a Bludger, hope it broke his nose — only joking, Professor — Slytherins score — A no…"

The Slytherins were cheering. No one seemed to have noticed that Heather's broom was behaving strangely. It was carrying her slowly higher, away from the game, jerking and twitching as it went.

"Dunno what Heather thinks she's doing," Hagrid mumbled. He stared through his binoculars. "If I didn' know better, I'd say she'd lost control of her broom…but she can't have…"

Suddenly, people were pointing up at Heather all over the stands.

Her broom had started to roll over and over, with her only just managing to hold on. Then the whole crowd gasped. Heather's broom had given a wild jerk and Heather swung off it. She was now dangling from it, holding on with only one hand, claws out, trying to keep her grip.

"Did something happen to it when Flint blocked her?" Seamus whispered.

"Can't have," Hagrid said, his voice shaking. "Can't nothing interfere with a broomstick except powerful Dark magic — no kid could do that to a Nimbus Two Thousand."

At these words, Hermione seized Hagrid's binoculars, but instead of looking up at Heather, she started looking frantically at the crowd.

"What are you doing?" moaned Ron, gray-faced.

"I knew it," Hermione gasped, "Snape — look."

Ron grabbed the binoculars. Snape was in the middle of the stands opposite them. He had his eyes fixed on Heather and was muttering nonstop under his breath.

"He's doing something — jinxing the broom," said Hermione.

"What should we do?"

"Leave it to me."

Before Ron could say another word, Hermione had disappeared. Ron turned the binoculars back on Heather.

Her broom was vibrating so hard, it was almost impossible for her to hang on much longer. The whole crowd was on its feet, watching, terrified, as the Weasleys flew up to try and pull Heather safely onto one of their brooms, but it was no good – every time they got near him, the broom would jump higher still. They dropped lower and circled beneath her, obviously hoping to catch her if she fell.

Marcus Flint seized the Quaffle and scored five times without anyone noticing.

"Come on, Hermione," Ron muttered desperately.

Hermione had fought her way across to the stand where Snape stood, and was now racing along the row behind him; she didn't even stop to say sorry as she knocked Professor Quirrell headfirst into the row in front.

Reaching Snape, she crouched down, pulled out her wand, and whispered a few, well-chosen words. Bright blue flames shot from her wand onto the hem of Snape's robes.

It took perhaps thirty seconds for Snape to realize that he was on fire. A sudden yelp told her she had done her job. Scooping the fire off him into a little jar in her pocket, she scrambled back along the row — Snape would never know what had happened.

It was enough. Up in the air, Heather was suddenly able to clamber back on to her broom.

"Neville, you can look!" Ron said. Neville had been sobbing into Hagrid's jacket for the last five minutes.

Heather was speeding toward the ground when the crowd saw her clap her hand to her mouth as though she was about to be sick — she hit the field on all fours — coughed — and something gold fell into her hand.

"I've got the Snitch!" She shouted, waving it above her head, and the game ended in complete confusion.

"She didn't catch it, she nearly swallowed it," Flint was still howling twenty minutes later, but it made no difference — Heather hadn't broken any rules and Lee Jordan was still happily shouting the results — Gryffindor had won by one hundred and seventy points to sixty. Perhaps she should make that her signature catch. Heather heard none of this, though. She was being made a cup of strong tea back in Hagrid's hut, with Ron and Hermione.

"It was Snape," Ron was explaining, "Hermione and I saw him. He was cursing your broomstick, muttering, he wouldn't take his eyes off you."

"Rubbish," said Hagrid, who hadn't heard a word of what had gone on next to him in the stands. "Why would Snape do somethin' like that?"

"Technically eye contact, no blinking and muttering could be a counter curse to." The green eyed girl pointed out. Heather, Ron, and Hermione then looked at one another, wondering what else to tell him. Heather decided on the truth.

"I found out something about him though," she told Hagrid. "He was in the corridor with that three-headed dog on Halloween. It bit him. We think he mightpossibly," Heather strained the word fixing Ron with a pointed look, "be trying to steal whatever it's guarding."

Hagrid dropped the teapot.

"How do you know about Fluffy?" he said.

"Fluffy?"

"Yeah — he's mine — bought him off a Greek chappie I met in the pub las' year — I lent him to Dumbledore to guard the —"

"Yes?" said Heather eagerly.

"Now, don't ask me anymore," said Hagrid gruffly. "That's top secret, that is."

"But Snape's could be trying to steal it."

"Rubbish," said Hagrid again. "Snape's a Hogwarts teacher; he'd do nothin' of the sort."

"So why did he just try and kill Heather?" cried Hermione.

'Could have been trying to save me.' Heather thought but decided not to try and waste her breath. The afternoon's events certainly seemed to have changed Hermione's mind about Snape. but then again she was logical so she was probably just a little shaken, since Heather had nearly died and Hermione had set Snape on fire.

"I know a jinx when I see one, Hagrid, I've read all about them! You've got to keep eye contact, and Snape wasn't blinking at all, I saw him!"

"I'm tellin' yeh, yer wrong!" said Hagrid hotly. "I don' know why Heather's broom acted like that, but Snape wouldn' try an' kill a student! Now, listen to me, all three of yeh — yer meddlin' in things that don' concern yeh. It's dangerous. You forget that dog, an' you forget what it's guardin', that's between Professor Dumbledore an' Nicolas Flamel —"

"Aha!" said Heather, "so there's someone called Nicolas Flamel involved, is there?"

Hagrid looked furious with himself. He then told them to head back to the castle. On the way back Ron turned to Heather.

"Why are you defending Snape, I thought you hated him." said Ron.

"I do believe me. God knows how many times I've imagined his death in the most violent and bloody ways possible but," Heather took a deep breath to calm her rising nerves. "I'm going to be the bigger person and try and find out what is going on by turning the other cheek and not let my personal hatred towards Snape cloud my judgment."

**Now to answer a question or complaint I know many will have, the reason why Snape took Heather's offer of help. He gave in because she looked exactly like Lilly whenever he would get heart and refuse her help to fix him. We all know that must have happened once. Snape will be slightly nicer to Heather in the story because she looks like his dead love, but he's still Snape so...you know.**


	10. Christmas Break Part1

Christmas was coming. One morning in mid-December, Hogwarts woke to find itself covered in several feet of snow. The lake froze solid and the Weasley twins were punished for bewitching several snowballs so that they followed Quirrell around, bouncing off the back of his turban. The few owls that managed to battle their way through the stormy sky to deliver mail had to be nursed back to health by Hagrid before they could fly off again. No one could wait for the holidays to start. While the Gryffindor common room and the Great Hall had roaring fires, the drafty corridors had become icy and a bitter wind rattled the windows in the classrooms. Worst of all were Professor Snape's classes down in the dungeons, where their breath rose in a mist before them and they kept as close as possible to their hot cauldrons.

"I do feel so sorry," said Draco Malfoy, one Potions class, "for all those people who have to stay at Hogwarts for Christmas because they're not wanted at home."

He was looking over at Heather as he spoke. Crabbe and Goyle chuckled. Heather, who was measuring out powdered spine of lionfish, ignored them. Malfoy had been even more unpleasant than usual since the Quidditch match. Disgusted that the Slytherins had lost, he had tried to get everyone laughing at how a wide-mouthed tree frog would be replacing Heather as Seeker next. Then he'd realized that nobody found this funny, because they were all so impressed at the way Heather had managed to stay on her bucking broomstick. So Malfoy, jealous and angry, had gone back to taunting Heather about having no proper family.

Eventually Heather snapped. "For your information Malfoy I am going home for Christmas, home to the best family I could ask for so shut the hell up!"

"Oh come now Potter. Have a little Christmas spirit. Why not run through the halls with some jingle bells tied to your tail?" Malfoy smirked.

Heather's ears popped out and so did her tail, which was held high and fluffed out. "Zip it Malfoy, or I'm going to kick you in the jingle bells." She snarled. Malfoy did the smart thing and went back to his potion at that point. Ron and his brothers on the other hand were staying, because Mr. and Mrs. Weasley were going to Romania to visit Charlie.

When they left the dungeons at the end of Potions, they found a large fir tree blocking the corridor ahead. Two enormous feet sticking out at the bottom and a loud puffing sound told them that Hagrid was behind it.

"Hi, Hagrid, want any help?" Ron asked, sticking his head through the branches.

"Nah, I'm alright, thanks, Ron."

"Would you mind moving out of the way?" came Malfoy's cold drawl from behind them. "Are you trying to earn some extra money, Weasley? Hoping to be gamekeeper yourself when you leave Hogwarts, I suppose — that hut of Hagrid's must seem like a palace compared to what your family's used to."

Ron dived at Malfoy but Heather held him back just as Snape came up the stairs.

"What is going on here?" The entire scene was frozen before the potions master. Heather still was holding Ron from behind. Thinking quickly Heather threw on an angelic smile.

"I was just saying goodbye to Ron Professor. I'm going home for Christmas. See you Ron, I'm gonna miss ya." Ron quickly caught on.

"I'll miss you too. Come on we got to go meet Hermione down at the library to finish our homework." The two Gryffindors quickly jogged down to the library before anymore questions could be asked.

"I'll get him," said Ron, grinding his teeth at Malfoy's back, "one of these days, I'll get him —"

"I hate them both," said Heather, "Malfoy and Snape."

They had been searching books for Flamel's name ever since Hagrid had let it slip, because how else were they going to find out what the thief was trying to steal? Ron still insisted it was Snape. The trouble was, it was very hard to know where to begin, not knowing what Flamel might have done to get himself into a book.

He wasn't in Great Wizards of the Twentieth Century, or Notable Magical Names of Our Time; he was missing, too, from Important Modern Magical Discoveries, and A Study of Recent Developments in Wizardry. And then, of course, there was the sheer size of the library; tens of thousands of books; thousands of shelves; hundreds of narrow rows. Hermione took out a list of subjects and titles she had decided to search while Ron strode off down a row of books and started pulling them off the shelves at random.

Heather wandered over to the Restricted Section. She had been wondering for a while if Flamel wasn't somewhere in there. Unfortunately, you needed a specially signed note from one of the teachers to look in any of the restricted books, and she knew she'd never get one. These were the books containing powerful Dark Magic never taught at Hogwarts, and only read by older students studying advanced Defense Against the Dark Arts.

"What are you looking for, girl?"

"Nothing," said Heather.

Madam Pince the librarian brandished a feather duster at her.

"You'd better get out, then. Go on — out!"

Wishing she'd been a bit quicker at thinking up some story, Heather left the library. She, Ron, and Hermione had already agreed they'd better not ask Madam Pince where they could find Flamel. They were sure she'd be able to tell them, but they couldn't risk Snape hearing what they were up to.

Heather waited outside in the corridor to see if the other two had found anything, but she wasn't very hopeful. They had been looking for two weeks, after all, but as they only had odd moments between lessons it wasn't surprising they'd found nothing. What they really needed was a nice long search without Madam Pince breathing down their necks. Five minutes later, Ron and Hermione joined her, shaking their heads. They went off to lunch.

"You will keep looking while we're away, won't you?" said Hermione. "And send me an owl if you find anything."

"And you could ask your parents if they know who Flamel is," said Ron. "It'd be safe to ask them."

"Very safe, as they're both dentists," said Hermione.

Hermione and Heather walked out of the Great hall after saying goodbye to all their friends. Hermione was carrying her trunk and Heather had her special pouch necklace that held all her things. She was so excited to get back home to her pack. She wanted to go hunting with Tsume and play fight with Toboe. She also wanted to see how the others were doing and meet the new pack mate Kingu.

Hermione asked more questions about pack life. She liked hearing about the individual wolves in Heather's pack, how they were all so different yet they worked so well together. Hermione pointed out that she should give Blaze her Herbology and Potions books to look over. Since they had facts about healing remedies in them scattered throughout she would be able to use them. Heather mentally smacked herself for not thinking about that. Once the train stopped Heather helped Hermione get her trunk down and the two walked out onto the platform. Hermione's parents were there to greet her.

"Hermione darling!" Hermione's mother called. Mrs. Granger had dark brown hair in a bun, green eyes and pale skin. Hermione ran forward and gave her mother a hug.

"We missed you so much sweetheart!" Her father said. He too had dark brown hair but unlike his wife he had brown eyes.

"I missed you guys to." Hermione said, pulling away from her mother to give her father a hug.

"Mum, dad, this is my friend I told you about, Heather Potter." Hermione said, gesturing to the red head.

Mrs. Granger smiled at Heather and held out her hand. Heather shook it with a smile.

"It's very nice to meet you Mr. and Mrs. Granger." A short introduction was made before Heather scented two wolves.

She turned her head and saw Tsume walking her way along with Blaze and Mary. Tsume looked the same as ever in human form. Mary had long waist length straight white hair, white blouse, faded dark blue shall, black flats and along black skirt. Her face was scared but she had kind brown eyes to match her smile. Blaze had hip length wavy black hair, purple eyes with black eyeliner, she had all her jewelry that she did in wolf form, ripped jeans, purple sleeveless turtleneck, black high collar coat with silver buttons and dark brown ankle boots.

"Heather, so good to see you again." Mary said and gave her a big hug. Heather was surprised, she hadn't known Mary for long but she hugged her back nonetheless.

"Good to have you back." Tsume smirked and ruffled her hair.

Heather smiled and then turned to Hermione. "Hermione this is Blaze, our medicine wolf, Mary, the pack elder and Tsume, our beta."

Hermione was very excited about meeting the wolves but based off of Heather's advice she calmed down and made sure not to pester Tsume, since he didn't like humans. Mary was very accepting towards Hermione and eagerly greeted Hermione's parents. Soon it was time to head back into the forest.

The wolves walked out of the platform, out of the station and eventually the city. Finally once they were out they morphed into wolf form and ran towards home. They had to run a little slower since Mary wasn't quite as fast as she once was but they made it to the mansion in good time.

**(I AM GOING TO BE A LITTLE MORE DESCRIPTIVE ABOUT THE MANSION JUST SO YOU GUYS CAN CLEARLY PICTURE IT)**

Everything looked exactly the same, minus the snow cover. The black iron fence, large stone building, big solid wood doors up a few stones steps and on the door there was a head knocker. Once inside she took a moment to just breathe everything.

At the end of the foyer was the big staircase that lead upstairs to where most of the rooms were, except for Heather's which was in the formerly hidden staircase down the hallway in the east wing. There were big ornate and decorative rugs down each hallway and down the hallways were completely made of stain glass windows. There were big crystal chandeliers here or there, and old antiques that were there originally that the pack had decided to keep.

Though the kitchen was completely modern it was enormous, since it was combined with the dining room, which, could seat about twenty-six without having to add any new chairs. In the living room there were two large sectionals pushed together around a large circular coffe table in front of a huge plasma TV. Hige had gotten an Xbox360, Wii and a Kinect to play video games.

When they walked in Heather was immediately enveloped in hugs and other greetings from her pack members. Heather grinned a wolfish grin. She was back home, with her family and those she loved. One of the things Heather loved about being in a wolf pack was how close everyone was and how they all relied on each other. They were all happy to share anything and everything they had.

She then saw her new pack mate, Kingu. He walked forward slowly. Heather let her tail droop and her ears lower slightly so that she seemed less threatening. Kingu walked forward and gave Heather's side a curious sniff; she did the same to him. Heather gently touched her nose to his ear; ignoring the nervous twitch it gave.

"Welcome to the pack." She said with a smile.

"T-thank you." Kingu stuttered but smiled. Heather smiled in return.

"So Heather," Blue said, coming out from her peripheral vision, "tell us all about your time at the magic human school, a letter can only tell so much."

Everyone in the pack settled down around the room and she told them everything she could. They smiled when Heather told them about Hagrid, her friends and Quidditch, they were leaning forward at the mentions of the troll and three headed dog and they growled whenever Malfoy or Snape were mentioned. By the time she was finished she had talked herself horse and her mouth was sore.

Heather checked the clock, it was six. She got up and stretched. "We should probably go out and catch dinner." Heather said, yawning all the while.

"You're right." Kiba said.

Tsume got up. "Let's have Heather lead a hunt, let's make sure she hasn't lost her instincts." He smirked, if a wolf could.

"Are you saying I've gone soft?" Heather glared, baring her fangs.

"As. A. Marsh. Mellow." He said.

Snarling Heather pounced on Tsume and knocked him to the ground. They then began to fight like they did when Tsume was training her. While Tsume was far stronger than Heather she was more flexible and faster. No one interfered; wanting to make sure their little red she-wolf was still as ferocious as they remembered. They got the answer they were hoping for when Heather kept evading Tsume's blows and managed to score a few of her own. Finally Kiba told them to stop.

"Save your energy, you'll need it to bring down prey. Heather, you will lead the hunting party, take Tsume, Blue, Kingu and Toboe. Try near the Shadowed Pines, while I was patrolling the borders I saw some deer tracks. Go see if there's anything left there." All five of them nodded and headed out the door, following the small female.

They made their way north, trying to catch the scent of deer or perhaps some hoof prints. Keeping her nose to the snow covered ground Heather was just a little ways away from the forest before she found a scent. She flicked her right ear, indicating her find. The other's let out small noises of recognition and followed Heather into the woods.

Soon Heather was not only following a scent, but fresh hoof tracks to. She was getting excited, as were the other wolves. She could already taste it in her mouth, it almost made her mouth water but she kept in control.

Finally she spotted the heard. Studying the heard she picked out an old buck with a funny looking leg. Perfect. Heather gave the signal and the other wolves moved through the bushes to get into position. Heather crept forward, trying to get as close as possible without alerting the deer of her presence.

Once every wolf was in position Heather leapt from her hiding place snarling. The herd panicked and took off. Heather ran after them, the other pack members joining in. They steered the old buck away from the herd so that they could take it down. Heather and Toboe were running on either side, keeping it in line, Blue and Kingu were trying to slow it down and Tsume was getting ready for a killing strike.

Tsume leapt at the buck's throat and a loud snap filled the forest. The buck fell to the ground, dead. Everyone in the hunting party howled to the heavens in victory. This was defiantly a good hunt. Suddenly she heard heavy paw steps pounding towards their location. Heather's fur bristled and she growled. The others herd it to and got into an attack formation.

A bear leapt from the bushes and roared. Heather snarled and dived to the right to avoid its massive clawed paw. Blue snarled and sank her teeth into its left forepaw while Tsume grabbed it's other, Kingu and Toboe grabbed its back legs to help keep it in place. The bear struggled but couldn't get free. It looked up to the sky and let out a desperate roar. While it had its head lifted its throat was exposed and Heather tensed, ready to pounce and kill the bear.

A black and white blur soared over her head and into the bear. It was a wolf. It was a male, slightly older than Kiba. He sank his teeth into the bear's throat and crushed its windpipe. When the bear fell the wolf let go and he stood up. Heather was now able to get a good look at him. He was black wolf with white throat, cheeks, inner ears, eyebrow dots, tipped tail and circles around his eyes. He had yellow eyes. He also had a nick in his right ear, three claw mark scar on his right cheek and dark grey pads and claws.

Blood dripped from his jaws which had an arrogant smirk. Heather felt anger and indignance bubble up in her, along with a growl. She had everything handled, she didn't need help!

"What?" He asked. "No thank you for your knight in shining armor?" He asked.

Heather snarled. Tsume stood up. "Thanks for the help." He said. He then narrowed his eyes and got into a position of dominance. "Who are you, this is our territory." He growled. The new wolf just flicked his ear.

"Name's Raven. Loner, handsome devil and a she-wolf's male." He said with a smirk.

Heather scoffed and rolled her eyes, while Blue snickered. It became too clear to Heather that she and Blue had different opinions about the new male. While Heather found him arrogant, obnoxious and conceited apparently Blue found him funny.

"Why did you help us?" Blue asked.

Raven turned to Heather and winked. "Rescuing damsels in distress is my specialty."

Heather snarled at him. Great, just when she thought she would be away from Malfoy, his doppelganger found her. Fantastic! Now she would be tortured at home to. The universe just seemed to love making Heather angry.

"Why don't you join us?" Toboe asked.

"NO WAY!" Heather snarled. Toboe shrank back slightly making Heather slightly guilty.

"That is the decision of Kiba; we'll take you to him. Let's bring back our prey, the bear to, this should last us for quite a while." Tsume said. Raven, Tsume, Blue and Toboe began to drag the bear back and Kingu helped Heather drag the deer back. Heather was still seething about Raven, how dare he? She was perfectly capable! He was underestimating her, something that really made her fur stand on end.

"Don't worry Heather, he's just an idiot." Kingu muttered. Heather couldn't help but sigh and smile. Having someone agree with her made her calm down.

"Thanks Kingu." Heather said, her tail flicking his hind leg.

As they followed the others Heather listened to the conversation enough to hear Raven say, "…Save your female paralyzed with fear…" Heather's anger spiked again. That little-!

"Hey! ...Heather could have killed that bear! If you hadn't shown up she would have snapped its neck in half!" Kingu growled. When the others turned to look at him he lowered his eyes and ears shyly.

Raven chuckled. Once they were all inside the gates of the mansion they dropped the kills. Heather turned to Kingu.

"Thanks for defending me Kingu. That was very sweet of you." She licked his cheek. If Kingu was in human form he would have blushed redder than Heather's hair.

"W-well it was the t-truth." He stuttered, ducking his head.

"You know," she said "I think you and I are going to be great friends." Heather playfully butted Kingu's shoulder with her head. He smiled shyly.

"Come on, we better head inside." Heather said and ran up the stairs, Kingu right on her tail behind her.

When they came inside all the members of the pack were gathering in a circle. Raven was sitting in the center. Kingu and Heather sat between Blaze and Toboe. It seemed they had already started talking.

"I have decided…" Heather leaned forward eagerly. "That Raven is allowed to stay, as the newest member of our pack."

Several wolves walked forward to greet the new pack member. Heather just sat there with her eyes bulging and her jaw dropped. Kingu just sat there with an air of …oh boy…here it goes.

"I can't believe this! The arrogant asshole is staying here!" Heather snarled.

Kingu chuckled. "Language Heather! Let it go, or are you just displaying the thin line between love and hate?" He teased. Heather whirled at him.

"I do NOT love him! I hate that infuriating rodent with every fiber in my being." Heather growled.

"Alright well calm down then, I heard that we were all going to the Moonlit Rocks to howl." Kingu said.

Heather immediately got excited and happy, her tail started wagging. Oh to howl again, she hadn't done so in so long. Heather started jumping around in a circle around Kingu.

"Well then what are we waiting for, let's go!" Heather cheered and ran out of the mansion.

Once the pack got over their shock at Heather's sudden burst of energy they took off after her. Heather, being the fastest wolf in the pack beat them there by quite a bit. She waited on the bone white rocks for the others to arrive and for Kiba to begin. Once he was up on top he lifted his head to the stars and began.

**I OWN NONE OF THE SONGS; THEY ALL BELONG TO THEIR RIGHTFUL OWNERS.**

_"Hey-O, here comes the danger up in this club__  
__When we get started and we ain't gonna stop_  
_We gonna turn it out till it gets too hot_  
_Everybody sing, Hey-O_  
_Tell'em turn it up till they can't no more_  
_Lets get this thing shakin like a disco ball_  
_This is your last warning, in a courtesy call"_

_"I am not afraid of the storm that comes my way__  
__When it hits it shakes me to the core_  
_and makes me stronger than before_  
_It's not a question about trust_  
_but will you stand with us_  
_Can you feel it, make it real"_

Tsume then lifted his head and joined in with his own song.

_"It's not like I'm walking alone into the valley of the shadow of death__  
__Stand beside one another 'cause it ain't over yet_  
_I'd be willing to bet that if we don't back down_  
_You and I will be the ones that are holding the crown in the end"_

_"When it's over we can say, "Well done"__  
__But not yet 'cause it's only begun_  
_so, pick up and follow me we're the only ones_  
_to fight this thing until we've won"_

Kingu then began. He sang much more different songs than that of Kiba or Tsume.

_"We all come in from the cold__  
__We come down from the wire_  
_And everybody warms themselves_  
_To a different fire_  
_When sometimes we get burned_  
_You'd think sometime we'd learn_  
_The one you love is the one_  
_That should take you higher_  
_You ain't got no one_  
_You'd better go back out and find 'em"_

Raven then began to rap. Heather hated to admit it, even to herself, but he was good.

_"Shake that thing miss Kana, Kana__  
__Shake that thing miss Annabella_  
_Shake that thing yan Donna, Donna_  
_Jodi and Rebecca"_

_"Woman get busy, just shake that booty nonstop__  
__when the beat drops just keep swinging it_  
_Get jiggy, get crunked up_  
_Percolate anything you want to call it_  
_Oscillate you hip and don't take pity"_

Refusing to be left out, Heather joined in.

_"Take a little moment to relieve all your tension__  
__Lose yourself to somebody else_  
_your mind's the creator and your body's the extension_  
_Give me that_  
_I'll give it back"_

_"If I scratch your back you need to scratch mine__  
__you need to get yours I need to get mine_  
_if I scratch your back you need to scratch mine_  
_you need to get yours I need to get mine"_

Blue also started to howl.

_"Got everybody watchin' what I do, come walk in my shoes__  
__And see the way I'm livin' if you really want to_  
_Got my mind on my money_  
_And I'm not goin' away"_

_"So keep on gettin' your paper and keep on climbin'__  
__Look in the mirror and keep on shinin'_  
_'Til the game ends, 'til the clock stop_  
_We gonna post up on the top spot"_

Toboe joined in, his voice ringing out for all to hear.

_"Sometimes, I feel the fear of uncertainty stinging clear__  
__And I can't help but ask myself how much I'll let the fear_  
_Take the wheel and steer"_

_It's driven me before and seems to have a vague__  
__Haunting mass appeal_  
_but lately I'm beginning to find that I_  
_should be the one behind the wheel_

What Hige began to sing made Heather smile, so sweet! He was clearly singing about how Blue made him want to atone for his crimes against wolves under Lady Jagura.

_"I'm not a perfect person__  
__there's many things I wish I didn't do_  
_but I continue learning_  
_I never meant to do those things to you_  
_and so I have to say before I go_  
_that I just want you to know_

_I've found a reason for me__  
__to change who I used to be_  
_a reason to start over new_  
_and the reason is you"_

Mary was joining in, singing a very happy song.

_"When you think all hope is gone__  
__there's a place somewhere beyond_  
_Take a chance and realize_  
_its right before your very eyes"_

_"Leave the dark clouds far behind__  
__and step outside, the weather's fine"_

Finally Blaze added her voice to the mix.

_"Fire and water, earth and sky__  
__Mysteries surround us, legends never die_  
_they live for the moment, lost in time, I can hear them call_  
_they're locked within the crystal ball"_

_"I feel the waves begin to rise__  
__far across the ocean deep within your eyes_  
_silently watching as they fall_  
_I can see the future locked within the crystal ball"_

The night was filled with the voices of every wolf in the pack, as one.

The next morning Heather was not awakened in the most pleasant way. Apparently Raven decided that flirting with her made her angry, so he decided to make her even angrier in a different way.

Heather was sleeping in her bed with the covers covering her. In the cold months she loved to get under layers of blankets and snuggle up and slip off to dream land. Raven took some slippers from Blue and dragged his feet across the carpet in Heather's room. Giggling he charged up some static electricity and touched Heather's cheek. It was a big shock, making Heather awaken with a shriek. She fell out of the bed and onto the floor. Heather picked herself up and glared wrathfully at Raven.

"Raven!" Heather snarled.

"I am not Raven," he said and picked up one of Heather's smaller blankets and tied it around his neck like a cape. "I am, ELECTRIC WOLF!" He then ran out of the room.

Growling to herself, Heather picked herself off the floor and decided to get ready for the day. She got showered, brushed her teeth and hair and got dressed. She threw on a black and white block stripe long sleeved shirt, dark jeans, brown ugg boots and her black leather jacket. Heather got out her Charms and Transfiguration homework and headed down stairs. She walked down into the living room and sat in a chair. She opened her charms book and began to work on her essay. She had been working for about fifteen minutes When Kingu came over.

"What are you doing?"

"Working on my magic school homework, if you're interested, you can read through my transfiguration book."

Kingu settled down on the floor and started scanning through the transfiguration book while Heather worked. Heather finished her essay and then traded books with Kingu so that she could work on transfiguration.

Heather was half way done when Toboe walked up. "Hey Heather," he then leaned over to peak at Heather's parchment, "What are you working on?"

"Transfiguration homework, the teachers gave me a little homework over break."

"Could you show us some magic?" Raven asked.

The pack had gathered around to see if Heather would perform magic. She suddenly got an idea. Heather smirked and pulled out her wand.

"Okay Raven. _Tarantallegra!" _Heather said and she cast the jinx at the annoying wolf. Raven's legs began to jerk uncontrollably in some kind of weird dance. Heather fell out of her chair laughing. The other wolves were on their hands and knees, shaking with laughter. Raven found it funny at first but now it was just starting to freak him out.

"Okay Heather…he he…please stop it now…please…help!" Raven kept dancing while Heather was grasping her sides, struggling to breathe and crying with laughter.

"HEATHER, HELP ME NOW!" Raven finally yelled. Heather struggled to her feet and to get a steady grip on her wand but she managed to do so long enough to lift the jinx and then collapse back into her fit of giggles.

Once Heather's homework was finished she spent the day either playing with Toboe, sparring with Tsume, helping Blaze gather herbs, getting to know Kingu better or just talking to anyone but Raven. He had been trying to get her to howl with him. Now, if Raven wasn't someone Heather completely and utterly despised she would have accepted but she said no.

Heather decided to explore the mansion some more. Even with all the renovations there still had to be unknown places that hadn't been discovered yet. Heather walked down the halls, knocking on the walls, turning over a random tune in her head. Suddenly she knocked on a section of the walls that resonated a hallow tune. She knocked on it again and a piece of old brick chipped away. Heather pushed on a brick and it fell inside, based on the sound it made Heather guessed it fell down some stairs.

"Hey guys!" Heather yelled.

Kiba, Kingu and Tsume walked around.

"What is it Heather?" Kiba asked.

"There's a tunnel behind this wall." Heather said, pushing in another brick that tumbled down the stairs to prove it.

"Wonder what's behind the staircase?" Kingu said.

"Only one way to find out," replied Tsume.

The wolves proceeded to knock out the brick one by one. Finally, they pushed one brick out and then the rest tumbled, creating a large cloud of dust. After Heather stopped sneezing she looked at the long staircase that descended into the darkness.

"That's a long way down."

Heather let out a small squeal and turned around to see Raven smirking.

"Only one way to find out." Heather said and then turned to glare at Raven. "Ladies first," and then gestured for Raven to go.

"Age before beauty," he countered and made the same gesture.

"No pain to gain." Heather said with a smirk.

"What pain?"

Heather's answer was to push Raven down the stairs. Heather listened as his yelps echoed off the stone walls. The red haired girl waited until the loud thumping stopped and then listened.

"It's dark, dusty and it smells." They heard Raven call.

Each wolf took a step at a time, their eyes eventually adjusting to the dark. The long stone spiraling staircase lead deep down, probably even underground. Once they were down at the bottom, after having nearly tripped several times on fallen bricks before they finally got to the bottom. Tsume found an old torch and lit it with his lighter. The fire lot the long hallway in a faint orange glow.

Heather slowly walked down the hall while the others looked around and Tsume kept lighting the other torches. She noticed that there were large solid wood doors, an inch thick at least with a small opening where you could peek in but there were iron bars over it. Heather tried to look it but she couldn't see anything. She sniffed the air and wrinkled her nose. There were decomposed remains in there. With that last bit of info Heather realized what this place was.

"Guys, I think this used to be a dungeon."

**There is the Christmas Break part 1. Now, The reason why my earlier chapter were crappy is because as you can tell i just copyed and pasted the story and fixed the names. I plan on redoing them at some point in the future, maybe when i have writer's block. Anyway, thank you for the tips, it helps me figure out what I need to fix, love you guys, Read, Review, Favorite and Follow!**


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